Random Thoughts of a SUPERMOM!

Planning is Half the Fun

2012-02-17T07:02:00.001-06:00

We are 98 days from our BIG TRIP! It doesn't seem possible that in less than 100 days we will be off on a journey to see parts of the world we've only ever seen in pictures {and on the Brady Bunch}. All kidding aside, we are SUPER excited about our trip! Jason and I sat down and mapped out a tentative course. We've made a few reservations at campsites, but the whole trip isn't set in stone just yet. This is a map that I used to figure out how far we will be going on our trip. In total it will be over 5,000 miles! That is a long way to drive...and a really long way to pull an rv! There are some definite stops on our trip, and I've included most of them on the map below.

We are still looking for great places to visit along the way, so any and all suggestions or links are welcome! I picked up a few books at the library yesterday so that we could start looking for some "off the beaten path" types of places and make sure that we hit all the "must see" sites too! I would love to take the boys to some fun "kitschy" places along with all the great wilderness & learning things we are planning to see!

We are pretty set in our plan up until we leave the Grand Canyon. We have either made reservations or called about places to stay up to that point, but after the Grand Canyon it gets a little complicated. Apparently Yosemite & Kings Canyon can get a lot of snow in the spring so they don't always make reservations for their campsites until they know they will be able to open. I get that...but I also don't want to drive more than halfway across the country without a plan of where we will be staying {I'm not very spontaneous, can you tell?}. And after we leave Yosemite & Kings Canyon we are moving on to big cities...while pulling an rv. I have to say that is just a little bit scary! But we want to see San Francisco{which btw is totally spelled wrong on my map!} and our plan for heading home is to drive through Los Angeles and hit 1-10 and come all the way back to Mississippi {with a couple of stops on the way}.
Even though we have a map, some reservations, and sort of a plan, we still have a lot of planning to do....and planning is half the fun:) Oh and we have still have a TON of work to do on the Airstream too!

This Time Last Year

2012-02-16T08:05:00.000-06:00

Sonic Drink Holder Valentine Gift Box

2012-02-14T08:51:00.001-06:00

Back in November I started collecting those cardboard drink holders from Sonic. I had seen some really cute gift baskets made with lots of different kinds of drink holders and the Sonic ones seem to be the best...plus who doesn't want a reason to order a few yummy drinks at Sonic:) Anyway, I was planning to use the drink holders at Christmas to make the boys' teachers gifts. I ended up giving them a different gift, which means my stash of drink holders {yes they are part of collecting vs. hoarding issues too} was still sitting in the dining room waiting to be turned into a cute gift box. I decided that Valentine's Day would be a great reason for me to pretty up the {kind of plain} cardboard drink holders and add a few goodies!

I started by gathering up a few things to put into the gift box: a coffee cup, hand sanitizer, a Starbucks drink, and a recycled PB jar full of yummy cookies.

I used some left over Christmas wrapping paper {red and white polka dots work for so many things} and some scrapbook paper to cover all four sides of the drink holder. I simply placed the drink holder on the backside of the paper and traced around the part that I wanted to cover. I used spray adhesive and a glue runner to attach the paper to the box.

I added a few vinyl letters to the coffee cup and the hand sanitzier just to make them more personalized. I also added a strip of chalkboard vinyl to the peanut butter jar {to cover up the sticky glue that wouldn't come off}. Then I let the boys decorate the jars with chalk. They wrote Happy Valentine's Day, drew a few hearts, and signed their names.

I added a circl of scrapbook paper to the top of the jar to cover up the Jif label and then filled it up with yummy Valentine M&M cookies.

To finish off the gift box, I wrapped up the Starbucks drink, added a few pink & white paper straws, and tied on a cute tag with some bakers twine. The boxes took a little bit of time and effort, but they only cost a few dollars {around $7 each} to put together and they turned out SUPER cute! I hope the boys' teachers like them:)

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Collecting or Hoarding?

2012-02-10T09:14:00.000-06:00

I have a habit ~~slight obsession~~ of collecting empty jars and containers. I'm not quite sure if it qualifies as collecting or hoarding though...where do you draw the line? Anyway, I find myself keeping lots and lots of empty peanut butter jars {they are perfect for gifting cookies in}, empty pasta sauce jars {there are so many mason jar type crafts out there that I want to try}, and empty trail mix containers {because we might make our own trail mix one day}.

They usually sit by the sink for a few days until I decide to finally wash them. Getting the labels off some of the containers is difficult sometimes so I procrastinate cleaning them until I get a small collection going:)

I had been storing my collection in one of our kitchen cabinets, but it started taking over a little bit {I think this may be where my collection is borderline hoarding}. We are in the process of moving Eli out of the nursery, which will be turned into my craft room...so I moved my collection into one of the emptied-out drawers in the nursery/craft room. They are out of the way for now which makes me feel like less of a hoarder:)

The point of this post isn't to embarrass myself with pictures of my jar collection, but to share the awesomeness that can be made with said collection! This is the happy that I sent to school with Grant today for his assistant teacher's birthday. Sorry for the not so great pics, but I forgot to snap a shot before we left home so these are iPhone pics {with Instagram which I LOVE} that I took in my car when we pulled up in the school parking lot.

This was a trail mix container {probably from Target because we love their Monster Trail Mix} that I cleaned up, added some polka dot paper over the stickiness from removing the label, added a tulle bow, and a chalkboard label to the top with a little happy birthday note. And it turned out really cute. It is the perfect way to gift some yummy goodness like homemade peanut butter cookies {which is why we have so many empty peanut butter jars}.

Please tell me I'm not the only one who collects random thing that other people throw away!?! What kind of collections do you have at your house?!?

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I Love You More Than Chocolate Marshmallow Hearts

2012-02-09T08:25:00.000-06:00

Eli and I are heading to library story time today. I'm kind of embarrassed to admit that my poor neglected third child has never been to story time. I took the boys all the time when Henry and Grant were little, but for a million and one reasons I've never taken Eli. A friend has invited us a few times over the past few months, and I had planned to start going in January....but I got sick, and it rained, and I had laundry to do...a million and one reasons! So we are going today! And today just happens to be the special Valentine party, which means if I'm going to show up for the first time I have to bring something cute with me:) Actually I probably don't have to take anything, but I bought these cute heart shaped marshmallows at Walmart a few weeks ago and I was kind of excited to have somewhere to take them!

So here are my SUPER simple, less than ten minutes to make, and really really really yummy

I Love You More Than Chocolate Marshmallow Hearts!

I started with a bag of pink and white heart shaped marshmallows, melted chocolate candy coating, and a handful of toothpicks.

Stick the toothpick into the side of heart shaped marshmallow and then give it a good dunk in the melted chocolate. Carefully shake off any excess chocolate.

After dipping, place them on foil...

...and add a few shakes of some pretty Valentine sprinkles.

After the chocolate hardens, carefully pull out the toothpick. You can dip another toothpick into the melted chocolate and covered up the hole where you pulled out the dipping toothpick, or you can just leave them as they are.

Place your chocolate marshmallow hearts directly on a serving tray, or put them into cute papers cups like I did. They fit perfectly into mini baking cups that I picked up on clearance last year at Target. These were a big hit at our house yesterday {my boys begged to eat the extra chocolate marshmallow hearts last night after dinner}, so I'm hoping they will do just as good at story time today. What preschooler doesn't love sprinkles?!?

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Project Airstream: A Shelf, Updated Bathroom, and All the Walls

2012-02-08T09:28:00.000-06:00

We are still working on our 1977 Airstream Ambassador. Things are going slowly, but they are going. I honestly didn't think it had been so long since I had updated about our progress, but my last post was in July! Apparently last year flew by without me noticing. If you want to take a look back at where we started with this project, you can check out these posts here, here, and here.

The outside of the Airstream hasn't changed much. Jason has repaired a few of the outside vents, and all the windows have been repaired and rescreened. Most of our time has been spent working on the inside though.

This is a view of the front part of the Airstream {this will be the living room/mine and Jason's bedroom}. We actually started working from the back so this is the least completed part of the whole camper...and it has become a bit of a storage space to hold all of Jason's supplies and tools:)

This shelf is the one big thing that has been done in the front though. There was originally a big plastic shelf here that had a few cracks and was a lovely aged yellow color. Jason pulled it out and repaired the wall around it, then built this wooden shelf in it's place. I just painted it this weekend with the green paint we picked out a few months ago. I think it adds a lot of fun color to a space that has pretty neutral so far...and it kind of reminds me of the 70's:)

This is the space that will soon be our kitchen. Jason gutted the whole area and reworked the plumbing. We bought a big butcher block slab yesterday to make a countertop out of of and we bought a new sink and stove top. Jason is working on reassembling this section of the camper right now, and hopefully it will be done in the next few weeks.

We bought a new fridge for the space and all of the camper walls are back in place. There was originally a big shelving unit attached to this wall. We are planning to putting a flat screen tv here with a small shelf underneath it to hold dvds and books.

This is a view looking down the hallway towards the back of the camper. You can see that all the walls are back up. The closet is past the fridge on the right hand side, and the bathroom is on the left hand side.

The bathroom was completely gutted, but Jason kept all the parts and refinished them. Reusing what was originally there was a lot more cost effective and a lot easier to fit into this really small space. The countertop and shower stall was repainted with a special plastics paint. We bought new fixtures and a new toilet. Jason has also been really busy spray painting all the trim pieces white {they started out a nice bronze color}. We still have to find lights and a mirror for the bathroom, but all the plumbing is fully functioning which was a big step!

This is the refinished shower stall....if you look back at the older pictures you can see how far this space has come. I didn't even want to look at the old bathroom because it was so gross, but now everything is new and shiny white!

This is the boys bedroom. We reused the bed bases, mostly because Jason liked the sleek almost airplane look of the original storage cabinets. Everything got a good cleaning and a couple coats of white spray paint. We have foam mattresses for the beds, but I am still working on sewing covers for them.

Jason rewired the old speakers and bought new covers for the electrical and 12 volt power outlets. Our plan is to add bunk beds above the two bottom twin beds, but that is still in the planning phase right now:)

This is the view from the very back of the camper looking toward the front. It may not seem like much, but we have come a LONG way from where we started....and there is still a ton of work to do!

Next on our list of things to do is getting the kitchen completed. Then hopefully we can work on installing the vinyl wood flooring. I am going to try hard to keep you a little better updated...and be better about documenting our progress! Hopefully I can share a couple pics of the kitchen and new floor before February is over!

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Football, That Stupid Pig, Ice Cream Sundaes, and Airstream Progress

2012-02-06T09:36:00.000-06:00

So did you watch the big game {and the commercials} last night? I have to admit that we really aren't fans of either of the teams that played last night, but we were cheering for the Giants...mostly because the Mannings have a little bit of Mississippi history and that history trumped the fact that Tom Brady's girlfriend is a supermodel {you know, because supermodels affect the teams that people cheer for}.

Anyway, we dvr'd the game because we had church last night, so when we got home Jason got busy with the fast forward button while I fixed dinner {aka put a couple of delicious slices of Papa John's pizza on paper plates}. We normally fast forward like maniacs through dvr'd games, but this one was different because half the fun of the Super Bowl is the commercials so we couldn't skip all of them! We did skip over most of the beer commercials and ALL of the Geico commercials {Please tell me I'm not the only one who thinks that squealing pig is the most obnoxious thing on tv?!?}. We LOVED the M&M commercial, but honestly there aren't really many great ones that I remember:) Lots of celebrity cameos {Seinfeld and Leno} and two products in one commercial together {Chevy and Twinkie} which just seems kind of weird to me!

Now everybody knows that yummy food is SUPER important for proper Super Bowl viewing. We had dinner covered with pizza, so that just left dessert...and I had something really fun planned for us this year! Last week I pinned these adorable ice cream sundaes that I knew my boys would love! They're called Super Bowl Sundaes and they were created by Katrina. I recreated {aka copied} her dessert without changing much, because really they were pretty close to perfect! The one thing I did change is that I used chocolate to attach my sprinkles and I didn't pipe on my chocolate, I just kind of smeared it on with a spoon. I figured my boys would devour these before they noticed that the audience wasn't perfectly placed:) Anyway here are a few pics that I took of the process, but head over to In Katrina's Kitchen to get a great step by step and see her {not quite as sloppy as mine} version!

Other than watching football this weekend, most of our time was spent working on the Airstream and planning for our big trip. Jason has been making pretty good progress lately. The bathroom is completely put together and fully functioning. We still need to get light fixtures and figure out what we are doing for a mirror, but all the plumbing is working and there are no leaks! We ordered our flooring a few weeks ago and it should be in one day this week. I am SUPER excited to get the flooring in because I know it is going to totally change the look of everything because right now the floor is white painted plywood! I helped out yesterday by painting a shelf that Jason built in the front of the Airstream.

We had originally planned to paint the shelf white, but I remember that we bought some {almost avocado} green paint back when we bought the paint for the walls. So I made the executive decision to go with green and add some color, because up until now everything has either been gray or white {with the exception of the boys room in the back that is a pretty turquoise/blue color}.

We also sat down and mapped out our trip and decided where {and when} we are going. Using google maps, I added in all our stops from start to finish. The trip should take around 17 days and during that time we are going to drive more than 5,000 miles! That just seems a little crazy to me...but I know we are going to have such a great time and see so many amazing things! I'm planning to take a few more pictures of the progress we've made on the Airstream and share it later this week, and {if I can figure out how to do it} I am going to share the map showing all our stops along the way.

Now, I must go do laundry because this morning I was digging through a pile of clothes trying to find uniform pants for Henry...and because all of Eli's clothes are piled up in a basket in the living room and they have been there for almost two weeks...and because there is a load of mine and Jason's clothes in the dryer that has been there since last Monday. Sometimes I get lazy and leave that last load of laundry in the dryer:)

Valentine Mailbox Magnets

2012-02-03T10:08:00.001-06:00

I'm still working on getting our house ready for Valentine's Day. We really don't have a ton of decorations out other than the cute Chalkboard Candy Boxes that I made a few weeks ago, and this really cute printable that I pinned and then downloaded from Oopsey Daisy. For the last few years, my boys have had some cute little metal mailboxes that I picked up at Target {don't you LOVE the Dollar Spot} and decorated with a paint pen...obviously before my days of owning a Cricut or Silhouette:) I pulled them out of storage and Eli promptly sat on two of them and bent them all out of shape! Needless to say, the last time I as at Target there were three new little metal mailboxes in my shopping cart. I decided to try something a little different this time. Instead of just decorating the boys' Valentine mailboxes with their names or initials, I thought it would be really cute to include a picture of them too...but I wasn't quite sure how to achieve that. Then I walked past our fridge and noticed two old magnets that I had saved just in case I wanted to craft something, and a light bulb went off! Those little mailboxes are metal which means a magnet will cling to it with no problems! So I set out to make some cute Valentine Mailbox Magnets!

Here are the cute {but oh so plain mailboxes} that I started with.

They look really cute {but oh so plain} sitting the edge of our stairs with the Chalkboard Candy Boxes...but they needed something to jazz them up a little and make them pop!

I started with two 4 inch by 4 inch magnets that I cut in half. I ended up with 4 inch by 2 inch magnets, so I opened up a few pictures of the boys in PSE and cropped their pictures to fit the 4 X 2 magnet. I printed the pictures out in black and white and made sure that they were the right size.

I used my paper cutter to trim the picture to the right size, and then I used spray adhesive to attach the pictures to the magnets.

After the spray adhesive dried, I grabbed a red Sharpie and added a little bit of fun Valentine graffiti to the boys pictures. The black and white pictures were kind of plain and this was a quick easy way to add a little color. You could also add some cute stickers or even attach some pretty Valentine scrapbook paper.

Then to seal the pictures, I added a few thin coats of Mod Podge.

I also cut out some red vinyl initials with my Silhouette, but stickers or scrap book paper would work great here too!

After the Mod Podge was dry I simply stuck the magnet to the side of the mailbox and they were ready to go! Eli was so excited to see his face on the side of his Valentine mailbox:) Now I just have to come up with some fun stuff to put inside their mailboxes!

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Groundhog Day Craft and Recipe Roundup

2012-02-02T08:36:00.002-06:00

Happy Groundhog Day!

{Apparently Phil did not see his shadow this morning which means 6 more weeks of winter.}

My boys were SUPER excited to get up and eat their yummy Groundhog Day Donuts this morning:)

I' m pretty sure Henry and Grant will be doing at least a few different Groundhog Day activites at school today, so I decided to look around and find a few things that Eli and I could work on too. Here are a few of the SUPER cute craft and recipe ideas I found. These are all linked to pins on my holiday pinterest board, so click over to them to get to the original posts for instructions and printables.

Source: letsgoflyakiteuptothehighestheight.blogspot.com via Kelli on Pinterest

Source: mrswilliamsonskinders.blogspot.com via Kelli on Pinterest

Source: allkidsnetwork.com via Kelli on Pinterest

Source: luckymecraftsandkids.blogspot.com via Kelli on Pinterest

Source: kitchenfunwithmy3sons.blogspot.com via Kelli on Pinterest

Source: lizardnladybug.blogspot.com via Kelli on Pinterest

Source: familyfun.go.com via Kelli on Pinterest

Groundhog Day Donuts

2012-02-01T10:07:00.001-06:00

Groundhog Day has always seemed like such a strange holiday to me. Maybe it's because I live in the deep south and the groundhog seeing his shadow or not really has no effect on our winter {because we really don't have winter down here...it's been in the 70's almost every day since Christmas}! But I do remember the movie Groundhog Day with Bill Murray being hilariously funny though it has forever since I've seen it:) Anyway, we haven't ever really celebrated Groundhog Day at our house. I think the kids may do a little craft or something at school, but nothing big. Last year I saw the cutest cupcakes on the Family Fun website...but I saw them too late to make them. Luckily this year I remembered that Groundhog Day was February 2nd before February 2nd actually got here:) So here this is the SUPER fun Groundhog Day treat that my boys will be starting their day off with tomorrow:

Groundhog Day Donuts

{I'll make them eat some fruit too since this thing is loaded with chocolate!}

Start with any kind of donut you like. You could even make these SUPER easy homemade donuts. I was being lazy so I just bought a dozen glazed donuts at the grocery store. You will also need some chocolate cookies, chocolate candy coating, and Nutter Butter cookies cut in half {or another oblong shaped cookie if you have peanut allergies to deal with}. I also used some sprinkles and a couple of chocolate chips to decorate the groundhogs face but they didn't make it into the picture.

Start by crushing your chocolate cookies in a ziploc bag.

Then set up an assembly line.

Donuts

Chocolate Candy Coating

Crushed Cookies

Foil to place the donuts on

Dip your donut in the melted chocolate. Shake off the excess chocolate. Then dip them into your crushed chocolate cookies.

While the chocolate is hardening on the donuts, decorate your Nutter Butter groundhog face. Simply cut the Nutter Butter in half, then use a small dab of the melted chocolate to stick sprinkles and chocolate chips on to look as much like a groundhog as you can. I used some heart shaped sprinkles because that is what I had, but mini M&M's would work good here too.

Stick the groundhog head down into the hole of the donut and you will have a SUPER cute groundhog sticking his head up to try and see his shadow!

These would be a perfect breakfast to start off Groundhog Day, or a really fun snack to sneak into your kiddo's lunchbox for school! Happy Groundhog Day...a day early:)

How do you celebrate Groundhog Day?

January Recap Via Instagram

2012-01-31T09:19:00.000-06:00

Date Night

1st Picture with Phoebe

Frying a turkey

No trailing wheels!

Rainbow:)

Pizza for the big {college} game:) We LOVE Papa John's!

Being sick is no fun!

Making some progress on the Airstream!

Making a mess in the kitchen!

100th day of school

Jumping

Oops!

Friday night at Chick-fil-a

Jolie's birthday party at the park.

Haircut time!

1st soccer practice

Grant thinks he's funny!

Crazy Hair Night at Awanas!

Chocolate-Covered Strawberry Waffles

2012-01-27T09:25:00.000-06:00

A few weeks ago, I starting thinking about making some yummy Valentine-ish waffles...fun waffles have kind of become an obsession of mine and I knew I couldn't leave Valentine's out of the mix! The only problem was that I just couldn't figure out a clever way to use my round waffle maker to make anything heart shaped. So I figured instead of making something fun shaped, I would do a combo of ingredients that are classic Valentine flavors.

Nothing says romantic Valentine's like a yummy chocolate covered strawberry! But lets be honest here, strawberries really aren't in season right now so you will probably either end up with small not so sweet strawberries or you will have to pay a ton of money to order fancy chocolate covered ones that end up not being nearly worth the $40 you spent to have them shipped all the way from California ~~{I don't know this from experience or anything}~~!

Enter the Chocolate-Covered Strawberry Waffle:

This yummy waffle concoction is made with a strawberry cake mix, so you are guaranteed that yummy strawberry flavor ~~without having to get it shipped from California~~. You could also make a homemade strawberry cake mix, but then you still run into the problem of strawberries not being in season...so I would just stick to the boxed cake! The only other thing you need is a bag of milk chocolate chips.

Start by mixing up your cake mix according to the directions on the box. Then add in half of your chocolate chips and give them a good stir.

Put the other half of your chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl and heat them until melted.

Warm up your waffle iron, spray it down with non stick cooking spray, then add your batter to the waffle iron. I use a large cookie scoop {the same one I use to portion out cupcakes}, and it takes a little more than three scoops to fill my waffle iron. Just play around with it until you get the right amount.

Once the waffles are finished cooking, carefully remove them from the waffle iron. They will be a lot softer than a regular waffle because they don't really crisp up...which you don't want anyway because you want a soft fluffy cupcake feel. Let them cool slightly, then drizzle them generously with the chocolate that you melted earlier. You can do that simple with a spoon, or you can put the melted chocolate in a little baggie, cut off the corner and drizzle away.

I don't really recommend having these waffles for breakfast...they're a little too sweet for breakfast. But they are the perfect dessert to end your romantic Valentine's meal, or maybe a sweet treat to surprise you kids with when they get home from school on February 14th!

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Play-Doh Valentines with Printable Labels

2012-01-26T06:00:00.000-06:00

I love Valentine's Day.

Not the cheesy cards or the really expensive roses...but the fact that we have a whole day just to celebrate love! I remember Valentine's Day as a kid being so much fun, especially all the great goodies that we got during our class Valentine's Day party. The first few years that my boys were little, I would pick up a box of generic Valentines and let them give them to a few of their friends. But I soon realized that you could do so much more for Valentine's Day if you think outside the box! Last year I turned some clearance Tootsie Roll banks into a Sweet and Simple Valentine Favor. They turned out really cute, so this year the bar was set kind of high! I started thinking of Valentine's ideas as soon as the Christmas decorations came down. I toyed with a few different ideas and ended up going with this cute Play-Doh Valentine after I found the 24 pack on sale last week:)

I picked up two boxes {one for Henry's class and one for Grant's class} of regular sized Play-Doh at Target on sale for $12.99 each. When you do the math the cans of Play-Doh end up only costing a little over 50 cents each. You could also try this with the smaller party sized cans of Play-Doh, but they weren't really much cheaper than the regular sized ones. I created a fun circle label {just the right size for the regular sized Play-Doh lid} that said "Doh" you want to be my Valentine? using a tutorial I found on pinterest.

{Disclaimer: This is my first attempt at sharing a printable and I'm not really sure what I am doing.}

Just right click on the image below and save it to your computer. Open it up in any editing software and add your kiddos name beside each of the hearts. You could also let them write their name in if you didn't want to edit it. Test print one on a sheet of regular paper first to make sure the circle are the right size for your paper cutter and the Play-Doh lids, then you simple print out as many copies as you need onto sticker paper. The page is formatted to print out on a regular 8.5 X 11 piece of paper. On my computer I have to select fit to printable area to make sure the circles are just the right size.

{A couple of readers have emailed me saying they can't get the printable to work just right when they right click and save. If you are having trouble with it and would me to email you a copy, contact me at kellibwilson (at) gmail (dot) com.}

Once you get your labels printed, use a 2 inch circle cutter to cut them out.

Peel off the back of the stickers and place them on the lids of your Play-Doh.

Then stack them up a take a ton of pictures because they turned out so cute!

You could also dress them up a little more by adding some pretty ribbon or tulle...but I figured my boys would be happier without the added decoration!

This really is a fun Valentine to give, and it worked out perfect that there are 24 cans of Play-Doh in a box and both of my boys have 24 kids in their class. The fun part of the big box of Play-Doh is that their are ton of different colors so the boys can go home with a can of blue or green and the girls can have all the pink ones:)

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Valentine Chalkboard Candy Boxes

2012-01-24T07:57:00.000-06:00

I love a good holiday tradition, and if it involves candy then it's even better:) For Christmas one of my greatest candy memories is getting those cute Lifesaver Books in my stocking, and for Valentine's day nothing says tradition like a little heart shaped box full of chocolates. I remember every year my dad would come home from work with three of those little heart shaped boxes in tow...and even though my sisters and I had been eating candy all day at school, those candy boxes just seemed special.

But let's be honest here....those store bought heart shaped candy boxes really aren't the cutest thing ever. I mean I took my time and picked out a few of the better looking ones at Target, and they still just really aren't my style. The great thing is, it's easy to make these candy boxes SUPER cute and all it took was a little chalkboard paint to get these:

from these:

I started with three candy boxes that I picked up at Target for $1 each, chalkboard paint, and a foam brush...easy, peasy!

Take the plastic off your candy box then start painting. I painted a few thin layers of the chalkboard paint with my foam brush. The paint won't adhere great the first couple of coats because more than likely your box will be made of shiny cardboard. Be patient and let each coat dry and then add another. I ended up doing four coats. Here's a picture after the first coat:

You may have a little bit of warping because of the moisture of the paint, but it's not a big deal just lay the heart flat upside down after it dries to straighten it out. After your paint is completely dry, prime the surface by rubbing chalk all over it and then wiping it off.

Then grab some chalk and have fun. You can decorate your Valentine Chalkboard Candy Box anyway you like. Add that special someone's name, put a fun Valentine's Day saying, or just draw a bunch of hearts. If you don't like your first design, just erase it and start over:)

I am planning on adding the boys names to a few candy boxes to give them for Valentine's Day. This would also be an adorable teacher's gift with a special message or picture added by your kiddo!

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Meet Phoebe the Puppy

2012-01-23T08:13:00.002-06:00

I don't know if I've mentioned this before or not, but I am really not a dog person. I don't know why exactly. I do remember that I was terrified of dogs as a child...maybe that has something to do with it. But I just am not a dog {or really any kind of animal} person. We had a few puppies growing up and I'm sure I played with them at some point, but I don't really remember ever being super attached to any of them. Now just because I'm not a huge fan of dogs doesn't mean that I don't want my boys to enjoy having a pet. We actually had a dog a few years ago {Corndog} who had an unfortunate accident with a car...but it's been a few years since the boys had a pet.

*****

Over Christmas break, my parents got a cute little part beagle part dachshund puppy.

And my boys {especially Henry} fell in love.

After seeing how much they loved playing with Eddie, I knew it was time to get them a puppy...and luckily Eddie had a sister that needed a home too.

And so we got Phoebe:

She is actually a really good puppy.

She plays well with the boys, hasn't tore up much in the yard, knows to stay away from our cars, doesn't bark loudly, only eats a little bit of food, and she poops in out of way places:)

We bought her a cute little wooden dog house and she has a pillow and blanket. For the most part she is content to nap in the sun during the day and sleep in her doghouse at night. We have let her in the house on the few cold nights we've had...and she is great about coming in and going straight to her little kennel by the back door.

Phoebe is getting pretty good at playing fetch. She loves the little squeaky balls the boys picked out for her a few weeks ago, and she also like to play with stray socks that the boys leave outside by the trampoline. Eli usually goes out and plays with her for a little bit in the mornings while Henry and Grant are at school...and she really gets some fun play time in the afternoons with all three boys:) So far the boys have been pretty good about taking care of her...Henry is in charge of food and Grant is in charge of water. And Henry is now officially on pooper scooper duty too!

So for now, I am trying my best to a dog person...and I have to say, it's actually nice to have another girl around the house!

Let's Go Fishing

2012-01-19T07:09:00.000-06:00

Give a man a fish

and you feed him for a day.

Teach a man to fish

and you feed him for a lifetime.

Chinese Proverb

100 Days

2012-01-18T08:40:00.001-06:00

Today is Henry and Grant's 100th day of school. Their school always has a fun 100th Day Party with all kinds of fun 100 activities. Earlier this week both boys took baggies with 100 items in them {Henry took toothpicks and Grant took Conversation Hearts} to share with their class. And yesterday the boys and I helped Grant's teachers hang 100 balloons from the ceiling of their classroom.

Yesterday I was also up to my eyeballs in cake and homemade buttercream icing:) Grant's teacher asked last week if I would make a 100 cake for their class, and I was more than happy to help out!

Honestly making a 100 cake really isn't that hard. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that all you need is a rectangular piece of cake and two round cakes. I mixed up two store bought box mixes. One I place in a 13X9 pan and the other I divided into two round 9" pans. After the cakes baked and cooled, I stuck them in the freezer to harder up. I've learned the hard way that boxed cakes don't keep their shape well when you cut them unless they are pretty close to frozen. After about an hour in the freezer I pulled out the two round cakes and used a 3" round cookie cutter to cut a hole in the center. To make the one, I lined the almost frozen 13X9 cake up next to the zero and cut it as proportionally as I could {sorry I forgot to measure how big the one was}.

After I had the cakes cut and ready, I did a crumb coat of buttercream icing. I used the Vanilla Buttercream recipe from Cookies & Cups and it work really well. After I did the crumb coat I stuck them back in the freezer to chill for about 10 minutes. Then I added the final coat of icing. It's not perfect by any means...one of the reasons I don't make cakes often is because I can never get the icing as perfect as I want it. But the pretty M&M's distract you from the imperfections:)

Just Some Rambling

2012-01-17T08:42:00.001-06:00

I'm making a cake for Grant's class today. A "100" cake for their 100th day of school tomorrow. I'm thinking about trying homemade buttercream frosting. I've only ever made homemade chocolate and caramel frosting before and I'm kind of worried....but I didn't buy any cans of store bought frosting for back up so I hope it works. I've seen a few recipes here and there that look pretty good, but somehow all these yummy baking blogs make their cakes look amazing and I know mine will never look like theirs!

Eli and I are home today waiting on the Dish Network guy to come out and work on our dish. We've been having trouble with it for a few weeks....the one channel that we can't get to work {that we really need} is Nick Jr! Kind of crazy that the channel watched most in my house is the one that is messed up! So we are waiting from 8-12.

I was sick last week. Like really sick. Apparently my low immune system means that when I get something like strep throat it really hits me hard. I seriously didn't get off the couch for almost three days straight. I only left the house one time between last Monday night and yesterday and that was to pick up my antibiotic at the pharmacy.I don't think I would have survived if my mom hadn't watched the boys for me last week though. She picked them up at school on Tuesday and kept them until Friday so I didn't have to deal with drop off and pick up each morning and afternoon. I'm feeling much better today, though I'm still a little tired. I guess that's what a fever, sore throat, and lymph nodes swollen to the size of house will do for you:)

We got a new puppy the week after Christmas. I tweeted a picture of the boys with her a few weeks ago, but I still haven't gotten around to taking pictures to share here with you. Our new pup's name is Phoebe and she is actually a pretty good puppy {and this is coming from me the not really a dog person}. She is a tiny little thing that is part dachshund part beagle, and she plays really well with the boys. Even Eli who is technically scared of dogs love to play with her and pet her. When we got home from dropping Henry and Grant off at school this morning, Eli reached down to pet Phoebe and said "I missed you Phoebe". Isn't that the sweetest thing ever?!?

Jason took the boys to sign up for soccer last week. Henry and Grant {who are just a little over 16 months apart} never seem to be able to be on the same team! It seriously blows my mind that they can be that close together and still fall into different age groups. It mostly has to do with their birthdays though. For spring sports Henry's birthday is three weeks ahead of the age cut off, and for fall sports Grant missed the age cut off by 22 days. That means in most cases, Henry has to move up but Grant is too young to move up so they end up on different teams. So we are back to the same thing we had to deal with during football....Jason is coaching Grant's team and Henry is hopefully going to be on the team that our friend is coaching.

There are still a few traces of Christmas hanging around my house. I still have out some cute green polka dot {with red accents} napkins out, and I still have a Christmas printable in my kitchen frame. I have been brainstorming some ideas for a cute picture printable similar to the "I am Thankful for..." printable that I made for Thanksgiving. I have also been trying to think of a cute {original} Valentine for the boys to take to school, but so far I've got nothing!

The boys got their report cards last week. They both did really well and made all A's. I made a copy of their report cards before I returned them so we can get some yummy free donuts at Krispy Kreme one day this week. Krispy Kreme is so not on my diet, but a yummy chocolate iced donut sure does sound good right now:) I need to get back on my diet after being off for a week while I was sick...though I actually lost about three pounds while I was sick because I all I did was drink Diet Sprite and each chocolate pudding!

Now that I've talked about donuts and pudding, I'm hungry...so I'm off to find some breakfast. Have a great day! I hope to be around soon to check up on all the bloggy goodness that I missed last week!

January Un-decorating & Redecorating

2012-01-10T08:38:00.003-06:00

We took down all of our Christmas decorations last week. The tree had been down for a few days, but all the garland, wreaths, and pretty sparkly stuff was still hanging...and since it was almost two weeks after Christmas, it was time for it to come down. But for some reason the house seems so bare once all the pretty Christmas stuff comes down. Our front door is empty...no pretty wintery wreaths here {when the temps have been in the 70's it hard to put something that says "Let it Snow" up!}.

So since we aren't really into celebrating winter when we don't get to experience one...I decided to just jump right into Valentine's Day decorating! The first thing I did was dump out all the peppermints from my Candy Jars and add in the Conversation Hearts that I saved from last year:) No sense in buying new candy every year when all it is used for is decorations! After Valentine's Day last year I poured all five jars of Conversation Hearts into a Ziploc bag and stored them in the back of the pantry. And now they are SUPER cute back in my jars again this year for Valentine's Day!

Since I'm in the mood to get ready for Valentine's Day I figured I would share a few of my favorite past project just in case anyone out there is looking for some V-Day inspiration!

Valentine Hula Hoop Wreath

My Funny Valentine

Tootsie Roll Bank Valentines

Love Note in a Pancake

Heart Shaped Cupcakes

Now I'm off to find my Hula Hoop Wreaths from last year so my front doors don't look so bare. Then I may start working on a yummy Valentine's Day snack to share with you {after I work on getting the three mountains of laundry put away first}!

One Word

2012-01-09T09:20:00.000-06:00

For the past couple of years, when January rolls around I notice that quite a few bloggers {including my good friend Kelli} share their "Word of the Year". I've always thought it was a great idea {especially since I'm not so great at making or keeping New Year's Resolutions}, but I've never participated before...mostly because it is SUPER difficult to think of one word to describe all that I want out of the next year! But after taking last week off from blogging and really thinking about what I want to do/change/fix during 2012, I finally decided on a word...even though I could probably use a list of five inspirational words instead of just one!

CLEANSE

I want to use this word as motivation to get rid of the things in my life that aren't what I want them to be. I want to be clean....free of the things that are holding me back and free of the things that keep me from being the best person that I can be.

I am hoping to take the word cleanse and apply it to all areas of my life this year!

*physical*spiritual*mental*

I also want to apply the word cleanse to my home and all of our things. I want to get rid of the "stuff" that we don't need in our lives that just seems to make everything cluttered! I'm thinking there is going to be some major spring cleaning in my future!

One of the first things I've done to cleanse this year is to drink more water. Water is a purifier for our bodies and I want to try and remember that something as simple as drinking a few extra cups of water each day can make a huge difference in how cleansed our bodies are. If only cleansing all parts of my life were as simple as drinking water:)

I've made the first step on this journey by selecting and sharing my word....now I just have to follow through for the next 357 days!

Oh My Crafts Vinyl

2011-12-30T06:00:00.000-06:00

I got an early Christmas present in the mail a few weeks ago...a big box of vinyl from Oh My Crafts! Even though we got a ton of packages in the mail in December, I was extra excited about getting this big box of goodies, and I was SUPER excited to open it up and start creating.

The first thing I noticed when I opened up my box of goodies was that the vinyl wasn't in rolls but big sheets. I was really used to the rolls I've bought before from craft stores and Silhouette, so I was a little uncertain about the sheets...but they ended up being way better than I could have imagined! The best part about these sheets is that they load into my Silhouette 100 times easier than the rolls! I normally have to try and load a piece of roll vinyl at least three times before it goes in straight...and the first time I put a piece of Oh My Crafts vinyl in my machine it went in with no problems! The vinyl sheets are 12 X 24, so I do have to trim down the sheets because my Silhouette will only load a 9 inch wide sheet, but if you have the newer Cameo or the bigger Cricut you won't have to trim at all! Oh My Crafts also sell rolls of vinyl but I think I may be sold on sheets instead:)

Before Christmas I used my Oh My Crafts vinyl to make a ton of great gifts. These cute paint bucket tins were in the dollar section at Target. I added an initial with red vinyl and some pretty red and green ribbon. Then I filled them up with goodies and I ended up with the perfect teacher gift for Christmas! I ended up making 13 of these little cuties and only used about half a sheet of vinyl!

My box of goodies also included a Vinyl Squeegee Tool. I have always just used my ruler or scissors to smooth down my vinyl...and I am so glad I have this Squeegee now! I'm actually kind of mad at myself for not spending the $3 on one a long time ago! It made applying my vinyl so much easier!

After I finished up teacher gifts, I moved on to the kiddos' class party stuff! I used a piece of my black Oh My Crafts Vinyl to make lots and lots of little circles {aka snowman eyes and smiles}...

...to make these:

The last vinyl project I have to share with you is a really fun one that my boys love:) And yeah, if you are thinking it's kind of hard to come up with a vinyl project for boys you are right!

Henry and Grant both got bow and arrow sets for Christmas this year and a couple of the arrows have suction cups on them. In true boy fashion, they got a huge kick out of shooting them at the glass on our doors....so Jason grabbed a dry erase marker and drew a bulls-eye for them. But after a couple of hours and more than a few kiddos taking trips in and out the door, the dry erase marker had been smeared and wiped off. So I decided a nice vinyl bulls-eye would work perfectly!

{Apparently my boys feel the need to run around without shoes or shirts on in the middle of December! It was in the 70's that day so I didn't worry about him too much.}

I used my Silhouette to cut out a couple of circle on some fun red glittery vinyl to make the bulls-eye. It's kind of hard to see up on the door, so I included this picture so you can see how pretty and sparkly it is!

I was very impressed with all of my Oh My Crafts vinyl and I can't for things to slow down a little here so I can create even more fun crafty things with my new stash of vinyl! If you are interested in trying out Oh My Crafts vinyl, now is a great time! They have some great deals going on right now and if you use the code OMCBLOG10 you can save 10% on your entire order!

*Thanks so much to the people at Oh My Crafts for providing me with a free sample of their vinyl. No other compensation was given and all opinions are mine!*

A Few Days Late

2011-12-29T11:11:00.003-06:00

I realize that we are 4 days past Christmas, but I haven't said it to all of you yet: MERRY CHRISTMAS!

We have been way too busy!

{shopping, wrapping, and assembling presents}

The boys got way too many toys!

{The playroom looks like Toys R Us exploded in there}

We have eaten way too much junk food!

{cookies and candy and chex mix. Oh My}

And we still have six more days until school starts and we can get back into our normal routine!

For now we are baking more cookies, jumping in the new trampoline, playing with lots of toys {including my new toy: an iPhone}, working on the Airstream, watching Home Alone on the dvr, and getting a new puppy. I'll be back tomorrow with a review of some awesome vinyl that I got to sample thanks to Oh My Crafts!

Upcycled Wooden Nativity

2011-12-22T09:05:00.001-06:00

I pinned this really adorable Wooden Nativity a few months ago. {The original idea came from Learning to Be Me and I have seen similar ideas a few other places online too}. When I first pinned it, I figured I would either get Jason to stop and pick up some lumber from the hardware store, or I would raid his pile of wood scraps to find what I needed. But one day I glanced out the back door and noticed this:

If you can't tell what this is, I'll enlighten you:) This is a cute wooden table set {there are two chairs in the set too} that my boys got second hand from my aunt. It survived in our playroom for a few years, and then got moved to the clubhouse a few years later. Needless to say the boys were kind of rough on the table and chairs...a few of the chair slats got broken, as did one of the legs to the table. This table was actually in the trash/burn pile until I decided it would be perfect for the adorable Wooden Nativity sets! The legs of the table were the perfect size for Mary and Joseph and the broken slats from the chairs were just right to make a few Baby Jesus figures.

I don't have any pics of the process...mostly because I was using power tools by myself and I figured operating a saw and my camera at the same time wasn't the best idea ever:)

After I broke off the other three table legs, I used the dimensions from my inspiration {6 inches for Joseph & 5 inches for Mary}, marked the wooden legs with a pencil, and then cut them to size. The Baby Jesus pieces were cut from the chair slats and I made them 2 1/2 inches tall. Joseph got a coat of tan spray paint, Mary got a lovely shade of blue, and I painted the Baby Jesus pieces white. Then I painted the heads an off white/yellowish color {just because that is what I had on hand}.

After all the paint was dry, I borrowed Jason's superglue and attached the heads to each of the figures {Mary & Joseph's heads are 1 3/4 inch wooden balls and Baby Jesus' head is a 1 1/4 inch wooden ball that I picked up at Hobby Lobby.} I let the superglue dry for about 20 minutes, then I tied the three pieces together with some raffia. I'm planning on adding a little note with Merry Christmas and the year to the back of each set with vinyl and then giving them out as Christmas presents to a few family members. Not a bad gift considering it started out as a broken table!

Christmas Initial Tee's

2011-12-20T08:21:00.000-06:00

We have a lot of Christmas traditions.

Christmas Eve breakfast and then ornament shopping, getting three gifts from Santa like the three gifts that Baby Jesus received from the Wise Men, making Gingerbread Houses and Cookie Cutter Men {that's what Eli calls gingerbread men}, new Christmas PJ's....and the list goes on and on!

One tradition I started a few years ago was making the boys a cute new Christmas shirt to wear during all the fun holiday festivities. You can see some of their shirts from years past here, here, and here.

This year I decided to go a little bit funky/non-traditional with their shirts, and I think they turned out SUPER cute {though I don't think Jason was very fond of the yellow chevron fabric I used because he said it wasn't really Christmas-y.} Oh well, the boys got a ton of compliments on their shirts when they wore them for pajama day at school last week! Even thought Eli's not in the picture, he has a shirt too...he just didn't want to wear his new pajamas the day that Henry and Grant wore theirs to school:)

I started with some green long sleeve tee's that picked up at Target for around $4. I dug through my fabric stash and found some cute fabrics that would match the boys new Christmas pajama pants. I ended up with yellow & white chevron fabric, red felt, and just a little bit of green & white polka dot fabric. I grabbed a few bowls from the kitchen and used them to trace circle on the chevron fabric and the felt. Then I printed out each of the boys' initials and used spray adhesive to attach them to the polka dot fabric. I layered the circles, added the initial on top, and sewed everything into place. I used spray adhesive to attach the whole thing to the shirts, then I sewed the biggest circle to the shirts.

Oh and did I mention I procrastinated these until the night before the boys needed to wear them, so I whipped up three of these in about an hour...yep that's how simple they are to make, and what a huge procrastinator I am! SUPER simple and SUPER cute Christmas Initial Tee's!

Candy Cane Cupcakes

2011-12-19T08:04:00.000-06:00

I signed up to bring cupcakes to Henry's class party last week...mostly because I wanted to try this fun Christmas twist on Rainbow Cupcakes, and I didn't really have any other reason to make cupcakes:) These cupcakes are SUPER easy to make, but can be a little bit tedious...though not as bad the Rainbow ones that have 6 different colors. Food coloring and a little bit of colored sugar sure do make for some cute cupcakes!

Start by mixing up a white cake mix according to the directions and then dividing it into two bowls. I used two boxes of cake mix because I needed a ton of cupcakes}

Use red and white {YES they make white food coloring! I picked mine up at Hobby Lobby for less than $2 a bottle, and the white really does work...though I did end up just pouring the whole bottle into mine!} food coloring to make your batter the color of candy canes:)

Start with white cupcake wrappers. Add just enough red colored batter to cover the bottom of the cupcake wrapper.

Then add a layer of the white batter being sure to make the batter completely cover the color underneath.

Continue layering the batter as much as you can until the cupcake is about 2/3 full. I ended up with four layers {red,white,red,white}.

After the cupcakes cooled I iced them with white icing and coated them with red sugar sprinkles...you could also do red icing and even add some crushed candy canes to the top!

When you bite into them, this is what you get:

Not really striped like a candy cane, but still pretty and SUPER impressive to the kiddos:)

Do you make any candy cane themed treats for Christmas!

Snowman Juice Boxes

2011-12-15T09:24:00.000-06:00

Last week when I opened up Grant's backpack there was nice little note from his teacher. It had information about their class Christmas party, and at the bottom it had a little line that said "Can you please send..." You all know that I am kind of an over-achiever when it comes to school treats, so when I saw juice boxes on that little line I was kind of disappointed....until I remembered these cute Mummy and Turkey juice boxes that I had seen earlier in the year! I decided that I wasn't going to just send boring old juice boxes, I was going to rock the juice boxes for Grant's class! I did a little search on Pinterest and surprisingly there were very few {actually I don't think I found any} Christmas themed juice boxes...I'm guessing because most people do the milk and cookies thing! So I brainstormed a few ideas and decided on Snowman Juice Boxes!

I started by wrapping the front and two sides of the juice box with white cardstock. I decided to leave the back of the juice box uncovered so it would be easy to remove the straw. I measured my juice box, cut the paper to size, applied a few lines of glue dot runner, and then folded the paper onto the juice box.

I used my Silhouette to cut out a ton of black circle onto some {Oh My Crafts} vinyl. If you don't have a craft cutter, you could use a circle punch or even a hole punch. I also cut out some cute snowman noses onto some orange paper...I would have used vinyl for that too but I didn't have any orange:)

I put the black vinyl circles on the front of the juice box for eyes and a smile and I added the orange noses with a little bit of glue. To finish them off I added a cute scarf to each juice box made out of ribbon and ric rac.

I'm hoping these Snowman Juice Boxes are a hit at Grant's class party tomorrow:)

Wordless Wednesday: Joy Peace Hope Christmas Card

2011-12-14T08:45:00.000-06:00

Stationery card

View the entire collection of cards.

2011 Reading Fair Projects

2011-12-13T08:44:00.000-06:00

Last week Henry and Grant both participated in their school's Reading Fair. We ended up deciding on two Eric Carle books, The Mixed-up Chameleon for Grant and A House for Hermit Crab for Henry. Before the boys started their projects, I did a little research online and found some really great slideshows on the Eric Carl website that show how he illustrates his books. After watching the slideshows, we decided to let the boys make part of their boards like Eric Carle makes his books! I don't have any pictures of the process mostly because Henry and Grant did most of the work in the afternoons and it was too dark for good pics...but also because I was too busy trying to keep Eli from running through all the wet paint to take pictures:)

To make the Chameleon and the Hermit Crab, Jason fashioned a homemade projector out of a work light and a few cardboard boxes. I traced the cover of the book onto a piece of plastic and put it on the projector, then the boys traced the Chameleon and the Hermit Crab onto some white paper using the projector to make them just the right size for their project boards. After they finished tracing, Henry and Grant cut each section of their animal out and made a sort of stencil to use on the colored paper that they had painted. Henry also got to do some splatter painting to make the sand for his board...I think that may have been his favorite part because of how messy it was:)

The boys didn't win anything at the Reading Fair, but they had a ton of fun reading some great books and learning to illustrate like Eric Carle! I think we may have a few more Eric Carle books in our reading fair future!

Nutter Butter Snowman Snacks

2011-12-12T07:10:00.002-06:00

If you have kiddos in school, you more than likely have more than one Christmas party to attend this week. That also means you more than likely need to take some sort of yummy treat too. I know some parents would much rather be the plate/cup/napkin bringers, but I LOVE to bring something fun and yummy for the kiddos to enjoy...even if it is way harder than just picking up some cups:) So if you're like me and ~~crazily~~ think that bringing cute treats for your kiddo's class is fun, then try out these {oh so adorable and really not that hard to make} Nutter Butter Snowman Snacks.

My inspiration for these cuties came from Pinterest {surprise, surprise}. Here's a link to my pin and a link to the blog post {My Pretty Purse} where the pin is from:)

Start by dipping your Nutter Butter in white candy coating aka almond bark. I used a toothpick stuck in between the two cookie pieces to dip them {though it didn't work every time because the toothpick slipped out or the cookie broke}. While the candy coating is still wet add two M&M's for buttons, mini chocolate chips for eyes and a smile, and an orange tic tac for the nose. They are SUPER cute this way, but to make them even cuter add some earmuffs too! I did the earmuffs the same way I did with my Simple Snowman Snacks last year....curl up the Pull n Peel and place them in the freezer to harden {this helps them keep their shape while the coating dries} then place the Pull n Peel on the snowman's head with two M&Ms on either side.

SUPER cute and really not that hard to make...though a little time consuming with all the small candy pieces. If you are concerned about nut allergies, you can use any other oval shaped cookie in place of the Nutter Butter.

What kind of fun treats are you making for your kiddos this year?

Nativity Garden Flag

2011-12-08T06:30:00.000-06:00

The busyness of the season has made our holiday decorating plans come to a stand still...especially outside. Other than taking down the fall decor and adding a few red and green things to our front doors, the outside of our house doesn't have a whole lot of Christmas cheer going on right now...no lights, no garland, basically no decorations at all.

Since Jason is the ~~crazy~~ brave one who climbs up on the roof every year to hang the lights {and there was no way I was going to try that while he was out of town for work}, I decided to remedy our lack of outside decorations as much as I could by making a new Christmas themed garden flag for our yard. It was SUPER simple to make, and the whole thing was basically free because I used fabric scraps from my stash:)

Burlap and Felt Nativity Garden Flag:

I started by digging out some red and white material, red burlap, and my bag o' felt scraps.

After a couple of google searches for inspiration, I drew a little sketch of what I wanted the design to look like...can you tell I'm not an artist!?!

I used an old garden flag as a guide and cut a double layer of the red and white fabric {folded at the bottom to make the bottom edge finished}. I added a little extra length to the top to accommodate for the hanger.

I used my pinking shears to cut the fabric so it wouldn't fray and I wouldn't have to worry about finishing the edges. I sewed around the two sides and the top with my sewing machine. You could easily make this no sew by using a hot glue gun!

I folded over the extra fabric to make the hanger, and then sewed {or hot glue} it into place.

I cut a piece of the red burlap to fit on the front of the flag.

I cut all the shapes for the Nativity scene out of felt. I laid the design out on the red burlap to make sure everything looked good, then I picked it up piece by piece and attached them with spray adhesive. After everything was in place on the red burlap, I turned the burlap over and applied a good coat of spray adhesive to it and then placed it on the flag. I also sewed around the edges of the burlap to secure it {and again you could totally use hot glue if you don't want to sew}.

With all the Santas, reindeer, and snowmen out there it can sometimes be hard to decorate for Christmas with Christ in mind, so I'm glad we have this little addition to our decor to remind us why we really celebrate this season! I'm thinking this might make a really cute kiddos shirt too...what do you think?!?

My sweet friend Richella over at Imparting Grace is hosting a great linky party called Home for the Holy Days! A great place to share the ways you and your family keep Christ the center of your Christmas. Go over and check it out and say a quick hello to the oh so sweet Richella:)

Oral-B Stages III & Crest and Oral-B Pro-Health FOR ME Cars 2 Viewing Party!

2011-12-07T08:43:00.000-06:00

Last week, my boys and I had the opportunity to host a really fun Cars 2 Screening Party thanks to MommyParties and Oral-B. We invited a few friends to join us on Friday afternoon right after school to watch Cars 2 and learn a little bit about some really great Oral-B and Crest products...plus we all got to go home with some free stuff too!

Before the party started, I got all the goodie bags organized. Since I live in a house full of boys, I was glad to see that the majority of our party pack included boy colored toothbrushes and some Toy Story themed items! We did have a few girls coming to the party too, so the Disney Princess toothbrushes were also nice to see. To make sure that the boys and girls each went home with the appropriate stuff {can't you just see a little boy being upset about finding a princess toothbrush in his goodie bag}, I tied the bags up with some cute pink and blue ribbon.

Before the party started, I popped a couple bags of popcorn and sat out drinks for the kiddos. I also made a big batch of Rice Krispy Treats, but for some reason I think the mom's ate more of those than the kids:) Maybe it was because they were too busy watching the movie to come get them! The kiddos hunkered down with their buckets of popcorn and watched {the majority} of the movie.

We had 9 kiddos at our party ranging in age from 3 years old {Eli and his little friend Jolie} all the way up to 12 years old {Grant's friend Morgan's big brother} and luckily the movie and the goodie bags were perfect for all the kids young and old!

We took a little break from the movie to look inside our goodie bags and see what kind of fun Oral-B and Crest stuff everyone was taking home. Each kiddo got an Oral-B Stage III Brush or a Pro-Health FOR ME Brush, a big pack of Oral-B Stages Flossers or Pro-Health FOR ME Floss Picks, a full sized tube of Pro-Health FOR ME Toothpaste, and a sample of Cars II Gummy Vitamins. I also gave out three fulled sized bottles of Pro-Health FOR ME Rinse to the three moms who were there!

My boys were most impressed with the Gummies, and lucky for us the party pack included a big bottle for the host!

And Eli LOVED the Oral-B Stages Flossers! He insisted on dumping out the entire bag so he could see all the fun colors:) And my boys have been religiously flossing their teeth since Friday when they opened their Flossers:)

We had a great time watching Cars 2, eating popcorn, and learning a little about some great Oral-B and Crest products! Thanks so much to MommyParties for the chance to PARTY!

**I was provided a Cars 2 party pack thanks to MommyParties and Oral-B in exchange for sharing about our party experience with you! No other compensation was received and all opinions are my own.**

What's His Name?

2011-12-06T08:02:00.000-06:00

We are still in the process of getting out all of our Christmas stuff and decorating our house. As we were unloading boxes last night I found one of the boys' favorite Christmas decorations....their Little People Nativity Set! We've had this set for quite a few years, and every year the boys love setting it up in the playroom and reenacting the story of Jesus' birth {and a few other Bible stories that they manage to throw into the mix too}.

So last night I sent Grant down to the playroom to set up the Nativity Set just like we do every year. He left, and Jason & I continued decorating the living room with garland and lights. After about ten minutes Grant came back into the room with two of the shepherds in his hand, and with the most serious face ever he asked "Which one of these is Moses?" Jason and I both started laughing:) After checking with Henry about the man's correct name, Grant remember that it was Joseph who was in the manger that night with baby Jesus and not Moses!

I think somebody may be getting some Bible Story Flash Cards in their stocking this year:)

Making a List...

2011-12-02T11:29:00.000-06:00

I sat down earlier this week and made a list of all the craft/snack/decorating projects that I want to do before Christmas....my list has more than 25 things on it! That means I have to finish at least one project {maybe even 2} every day between now and the 25th for me to get everything crossed off my list! I don't think it's going to happen!

You would think with a list that long I would get busy trying to cross things off...NOPE! I did get our Advent Calendar on the wall. It looks really cute, but it is completely empty:) I also managed to get the boys' stockings hung even though we don't have a tree or even a plan to go get a tree yet! And instead of tackling my list, I worked on something that wasn't even on my list: my front porch that still had pumpkins and footballs all over it!

I took down all the pumpkins and the footballs and added some red and green in their place! I hung up a cute wooden sign that I bought at a craft fair. Then I whipped up a wreath with some red burlap and leftover Christmas fabric. It's not much, but at least it's not still fall decor!

Even though our front door looks SUPER cute now, my list is not any shorter! Plus there is still a ton of other decorating and light hanging to be done! Please tell my I'm not the only slacker who still has a ton of stuff to go to get ready for Christmas!

Sweet and Spicy Almonds

2011-12-01T08:52:00.000-06:00

December is here. I don't know about you, but for me that means time to put out the Christmas decor, wrap presents, and make lots and lots of party snacks! I am mostly a baker during the month of December, but a party can't just have cookies and cakes:) This recipe for Sweet and Spicy Almonds is perfect for the buffet table at a party, but they would also be really great packaged up and given to one of your favorite people this holiday season...plus they are actually pretty healthy for you too!

You start this recipe by beating one egg white until it is nice and foamy. Whisk, whisk, whisk until it looks kind of like the the picture below:

Dump about 2 cups of raw almonds into your bowl with the foamy egg white and toss them around to coat.

In a gallon sized Ziploc bag, mix together your sweet and spicy coating. I started with 1/4 cup of sugar, and I added a sprinkle of salt, and a pretty good amount of cinnamon.

Then to give my almonds a little kick, I added in some crushed red pepper flakes. You could also add cayenne pepper and chili powder like this recipe {Sugar Spiced Almonds} calls for. Honestly you can add any combination and amount of seasonings and spices that you want....play around with it to see what you like best.

Once you get all your spices added to your bag, pour in the egg white coated almonds. Zip up the bag and give the almonds a good toss to coat them with the sugar/spice mix....this is where the kiddos might want to give you a hand too:)

Pour the almonds onto a baking sheet and bake in a 250 degree oven for about an hour. You can adjust the time to get the almonds as crunchy as you would like...and make sure to stir them about every 15 minutes so they don't stick or burn.

Let the almonds cool {or sneak a few while they are still warm and toasty} then store them in an airtight container until you are ready to party or you need to give someone a sweet and spicy gift!

What kind of snack foods do you like to make during the holidays?

Guest Posting at Serenity Now

2011-11-30T09:44:00.000-06:00

Today I am SUPER excited to be over at Amanda's place {Serenity Now} sharing my tutorial for a Metal Tin Advent Calendar! This is the first day of Amanda's great new holiday series called A Season of Serenity (Now) at Home....and perfect timing for me to be sharing an Advent Calendar since tomorrow is December 1st! Click over, check out my tutorial, and leave some comment love please. And don't forget to check back with Amanda over the next few weeks to see some great giveaways and awesome guest posts as part of A Season of Serenity (Now) at Home!

Mini Muffins Make Me Smile

2011-11-29T06:00:00.000-06:00

And hopefully they will make you and the person you share these with smile too...because this SUPER cute decorated egg carton is filled with Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins!

I pinned this cute egg carton idea from fiskar.com a few months ago. I was waiting for just the right time to make them, and staff appreciation at church turned out to be perfect time for me to whip up some mini muffins and try them out!

To make these, simply cut scrapbook paper to cover the top and front of your egg carton. The inspiration one only covered the top and left the egg carton writing visible on the front...but I wanted to cover most of the writing up for a cleaner look. The inspiration one also added some cute scrapbook paper and little note inside, but I figured the muffins were a good enough surprise inside without the little note:) I used spray adhesive to attach the paper, but a glue stick would work fine too.

Honestly, I was a little skeptical about the mini muffins fitting into the egg carton when I first got started, but as soon as they were cool I started sitting them in the egg carton and they fit perfectly!

Fill up your egg carton with yummy mini muffins, tie them up with some pretty ribbon or raffia, add a little note, and you have a perfectly cute and edible gift to show your thanks to someone!

Here's the recipe for the Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins {from allrecipes.com} just in case any is interested:

Ingredients

3/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
3/4 cup canned pumpkin
1/4 cup water
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Grease and flour muffin pan or use paper liners.
Mix sugar, oil, eggs. Add pumpkin and water. In separate bowl mix together the baking flour, baking soda, baking powder, spices and salt.. Add wet mixture and stir in chocolate chips.
Fill muffin cups 2/3 full with batter. Bake in preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes.

Miscellany Monday

2011-11-28T09:53:00.000-06:00

I have a ton of pictures in my November folder that I haven't shared, so I decided to join in with Carissa this week to share them....even though they probably aren't really blog-worthy!

Maybe it's kind of mean, but I think this picture of Eli is kind of hilarious! He was playing under our breakfast room table and somehow got himself stuck under one of the chairs. It's hard to tell from this picture, but his tiny little hiney is stuck under the cross bar of the chair:)

I tried to get crafty earlier this month with the leaves that Eli and I gathered on our walk. It was a major craft fail! I didn't lay the leaves flat to dry out so they were kind of wrinkly and wouldn't stick to the candle well....even though I sprayed them with a generous coat of spray adhesive. My Mod Podge was almost empty and I had to scrap the bottom of the jar, and I really didn't get a full coat on them. They are currently sitting in my china cabinet and I have a feeling they are probably going in the trash can soon!

I only took two pictures of the boys at their Thanksgiving lunch and they are pretty bad.

Henry the Indian & Grant the Pilgrim

We had an end of the season football party for Grant's pee wee team a few Saturdays ago. I made some fun football jersey sugar cookies for the boys with their jerseys numbers on them. They were gobbled up before I could get a decent picture of them, here's a shot of Grant holding his...with a bite or two taken out of the bottom.

I was craving a banana split last week when Jason was working late and I was home alone with three sleeping kiddos, but we didn't have any ice cream or chocolate syrup. So I made the next best thing: a Faux Banana Split with Nutella Drizzle:) I cut up a banana, added a big scoop of Lite Cool Whip, tossed on some peanuts, and drizzled a little bit of warmed Nutella over the top...YUM!

What kind of randomness have you been up to lately?

Happy Thanksgiving...

2011-11-24T19:18:00.000-06:00

...from my three little turkeys:)

I hope you all had a {family} {food} & {fun} FILLED day!

I ate so much at lunch that I am skipping dinner, and I think I may not be hunger for breakfast in the morning either....unless I burn off all of my lunch shopping till I drop tonight with all the other crazy Black Friday {even thought it technically starts on Thursday now} shoppers!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Scrapbooking Made Easy! My Memories Suite Giveaway!

2011-11-22T09:42:00.001-06:00

This giveaway is closed. Congrats to Kim at Today is My Someday!

I've shared a ton of different crafts on my blog over the last few years....mostly because I love being crafty. One craft that you've never seen on my blog though is scrapbooking. I've done a few paper crafts here and there, but the only scrapbooking I've ever done was for my kiddos' teacher {and they didn't turn out all that great}. I'm not sure why I never fell in love with scrapbooking. Part of me thinks it's because I don't have the patience for the precise cuts and small embellishments that are needed to make a scrapbook page really great. My days of avoiding scrapbooking were over the day I downloaded My Memories Suite!

My Memories is the number one selling digital scrapbook software on Amazon, and from just a few minutes of opening the program I could totally tell why. It is so easy to use, plus there are no sticky glue fingers, unevenly cut paper, or small embellishments rolling all over your floor! Everything is digital...just click, drag, and drop! Besides making SUPER cute scrapbook pages, you can also make a ton of other things too. I am seeing birthday invitations, Christmas cards, and even photo book pages made with this awesome software!

Here is a screenshot of the software just so you can see all amazing features it has...and so you can see the really cute scrapbook page that I made of Eli! One of my favorite features of My Memories Suite is that your fonts aren't limited like some of those other online companies. You can use any font that you have downloaded on your computer! See the SUPER cute font I used with my page....by the way, it's called Elise and it's from kevinandamanda.com:)

The generous people at My Memories Suite have agree to let me give away the My Memories Suite software to one of my lucky readers! Just in time for holiday too!

To enter:

Mandatory Entry: Visit the My Memories website and choose your favorite digital paper pack or layout.

Check out the My Memories blog. Leave a comment and/ or follow them.

Like My Memories on Facebook.

Follow My Memories on Twitter @MyMemoriesSuite

Be a public follower of Random Thoughts of a SUPERMOM on GFC.

Follow me on Twitter @SUPERMOM_Kellli

Tweet this giveaway with a link to this post and include @SUPERMOM_Kelli and @MyMemoriesSuite in the tweet. Can be done daily.

Sample tweet: Check out this SUPER scrapbooking software giveaway from @MyMemoriesSuite and @SUPERMOM_Kelli http://tinyurl.com/7weh9sl #giveaway

Make sure to leave a separate comment for each entry and include your email address if it's not visible in your profile. This giveaway will end Wednesday, November 30th at 12:00 noon CST. I will use random.org to select a winner and the winner will be notified by email.

I was not paid for this review/giveaway. I did received a free download of My Memories Suite to facilitate me in this giveaway.

Gobble, Gobble: Turkey Waffles

2011-11-18T08:49:00.000-06:00

Yesterday I admitted my obsession with crafty kids shirts, so now it's time for me to admit that I am just a little bit obsessed with fun waffles too! The first waffle I made was a rainbow waffle to celebrate St. Patty's Day. It's fun to have a colorful breakfast to help celebrate a holiday...but once I started I couldn't stop. I've shared some just because waffles {cupcake waffles} and a whole lot of holiday ones too {candy corn and jack o lantern}.

I have been brainstorming Thanksgiving ideas for a while now. It's amazing how hard it is to come up with a good waffle idea for a holiday based around food:) I tried to make Cornucopia Waffles with an abundance of M&M's, but all that did was make a huge mess of the waffle iron. So I decided to give Turkey Waffles a try instead. Now I know the name makes them sound kind of gross because seriously who wants savory turkey hiding in their waffles! Don't let the name scare you off...there is not a trace of real turkey in these fun and colorful Thanksgiving waffles:)

I started with the usual suspects...and my usual helper:)

**waffle mix, food coloring, and Eli**

Mix up your waffles according to the directions. You will need four waffles total to make two turkeys. By the way, these are sharing waffles...two people per turkey:)
*Start by making one plain waffle.*
*While that waffle is cooking divide your remaining batter into three bowls.*
*Add green, yellow, and orange food coloring each into one of the bowls and stir to combine.*

*Cook the three colored waffles and then get ready to assemble.*

Start by cutting the plain waffle in half and the colored waffles into quarters.

Lay out the colored waffles in a turkey tail pattern starting with the outside ones{green here} and working your way in. Lay the half plain waffle on top of the turkey tail and adjust as needed. Use one of the leftover yellow quarter waffles to make a beak for your waffle. I simply cut off the pointed edge and added it on top of the plain waffle.

What kind of fun foods are you making to celebrate Thanksgiving this year?

Pilgrim and Indian Initial Tees

2011-11-17T06:55:00.000-06:00

I have shared countless times about my ~~slight obsession~~ love of crafty kids' holiday shirts. I'm actually starting to think that maybe I should start a support group, but I might be the only ~~crazy~~ member! Anyway, with Thanksgiving only a week away, I decided to take advantage of our little sick day yesterday and get some sewing done on the boys' shirts for this year. I knew I wanted to attempt a cute turkey face shirt for Eli {I'll share his shirt later after I figure out how to add the eyes without making the turkey look crazy}, but I wasn't quite sure about what to do for Henry and Grant. I stumbled across a Pilgrim initial tee on Etsy earlier this week and as soon as I saw it I knew my boys were getting Pilgrim and Indian shirts this year:)

I won't bore you with all the details{and a million pictures} of how I made these shirts...you can go back and check out one of my other step by step tutorials if you like. But just so this isn't a single picture with a ton of rambling, I will share a quick rundown of how I made these.

**Print out each kiddos initial {mirrored} and attach it to orange and white gingham.**

**Cut out the letters and attach them to some orange felt.**

**Sew the letters to the felt with a zig-zag stitch and then cut around each letter leaving an orange border.**

**Use spray adhesive to hold the letter to the shirt, then stitch around the letter to attach it.**

**Make the pilgrim hat and indian headband out of scraps of felt. **

**Use spray adhesive to hold them in place and then sew them onto the shirts.**

Really the hardest parts of this project are deciding which font to use for the letters and getting the proportions of the hat right so that it looks like a Pilgrim's hat and not a crazy top hat:) For those of you that don't sew, you could also make this no sew with some ultra hold iron on adhesive! Except for the new white long sleeve shirts, I used all materials that were in my craft stash making these shirts cost around $5 each. Not too bad for two SUPER cute Thanksgiving shirts!

Wordless Wednesday: Peanuts and Pajamas

2011-11-16T07:10:00.001-06:00

Using Actions for Photoshop Elements to Edit Your Photos

2011-11-14T09:10:00.000-06:00

I've had a DSLR camera for a few years now, and having a nicer camera {even though mine is the the bottom of the line Nikon D40} really has improved my photos. Besides the fact that the quality of the photo is better, having a DSLR makes me think out the composition and lighting of my photos a lot more than when I simply used a point and shoot digital camera. But having a good camera is only the first step in taking great photos...you also have to know how to edit pictures to get the most out of each shot!

There are more than a few editing programs out there, some are outrageously expensive and some {like the one I have} are more affordable. I use Photoshop Elements for all my editing. I bought it when we got our new laptop a few years ago, and I think it cost somewhere between $80 and $100. The only problem with photo editing programs is you really need to know how to use a them to get the most out of them...and it can be quite complicated to figure out!

My biggest help in using PSE to edit my photos was when I discovered Actions! And even better I found some really awesome FREE Actions! I've downloaded free Actions from two websites {and I'm sure there are lots more out there too} : The CoffeeShop Blog and The Pioneer Woman. Having these actions has really helped me improve my pictures! I love all the different options that both of these websites provide, and I love the different feel you can get just by clicking a few buttons!

Just to show you what Actions can do for your photos, here are a few straight out the camera shots along with some shot that I edited with the free PSE Actions that I downloaded. I am not an expert with these by any means, and I honestly can't remember the names of the Actions that I used for each picture. I usually just click an Action and see how I like it with the photo. If I don't like it, I just click undo and start over. These next three photos were all edited with The Pioneer Woman Actions, but you can see some photos that I edited with The CoffeeShop Blog Actions HERE.

SOOC Edited with PSE Actions

I'm sure there are a few professional photographers cringing at my overeditednotverygood photos, but I think they look pretty great for a self taught phtotographer with SUPER squirmy kids! IF you are looking for a way to edit your photos without blowing the bank {or blowing your mind}, check out PSE. The abundance of free downloadable Actions totally make Photoshop Elements worth the initial cost.

{FYI I wasn't paid to share any of this with you even thought I know it sounds kind of like a sales pitch:) I really have been having a ton of fun editing my picture {including the photos that I used with my Thankful Photo Decor} with these free Actions lately and I thought you might want to know about them too!}

Friday Flashback: Craft Edition

2011-11-11T06:30:00.000-06:00

**This is a re-post from last year. I have been looking for some great Thanksgiving shirt inspiration for this year, so I figured I would share one of my Thanksgiving shirts for last year in case anyone wants to attempt it for their kiddo!**

I have seen a ton of cute turkey shirts for Thanksgiving floating around the internet lately. I had intentions of making my boys a cute turkey shirt, but was really wishing I could make something a little different and a little more fun instead.

The Shirt of Plenty is what I ended up with after a TON of inspiration {and a template} from Family Fun magazine.

This is the original craft shared in the November issue of Family Fun...SUPER cute Thanksgiving themed felt food. I simply decided to turn my felt food into a shirt instead of making a toy:)

The first step in making this SUPER cute shirt is to print the templates and cut them out. Sometimes the template calls for two of each shape, but you usually only need one.

Use spray adhesive and stick the cut out shapes to different colors of felt. You can mix and match however you want, or follow the suggestions on the templates.

Then add iron-on adhesive to the backside of the felt following the directions on the package.

Cut out the shapes following the template, then remove the paper and the iron-on adhesive backing.

Lay out your design on the shirt and decide where you want each piece to be. Iron the pieces onto the shirt following the directions on your package of iron on adhesive.

The finally step to making The Shirt of Plenty is the most tedious and time consuming....but it also makes a big difference in the appearance of the shirt. Using coordinating colors of embroidery thread, go around the edges of each piece of felt with a running stitch. Make sure to tie off each end of the embroidery thread well, so that the felt pieces stay securely attached.

And that is how you make a SUPER cute Thanksgiving shirt!

Now if I can only find the time {and energy} to make two more:)

Organizing the Laundry

2011-11-10T09:14:00.000-06:00

I know I'm not the only mom who despises laundry. I think between the monotony of folding and the fact that it's a never ending cycle of clean & dirty, most moms would love to have someone else take care of the laundry for their family! But like me, just because you hate to do it doesn't mean you can get way with not doing it! Sure if you're J. Lo or someotheroverpaidfamouspersonwhoneverhastodotheirownlaundry the laundry probably seems like a joy...drop it off and it comes back clean and folded and you didn't have to do any of the work! But in my house laundry is work, and the best way to make work easier is to be organized.

We've had the dirty clothes part organized for a while thanks to this lovely creation that I bought at Walmart a few years ago.

My organizational issues with laundry start after the clean clothes come out of the dryer. We have spent the last few years with just two laundry baskets. You can do the math and probably figure out that two laundry baskets for five people just doesn't work very well. And most of the time the clean clothes end up piled on the couch {and the chair} kind of like this...except this is a much smaller pile than normal:)

So I decided it was time to get my clean clothes organized by simply buying a few new laundry baskets. My original intentions were to find some fun colored baskets {ideally in blue, green, and orange to continue our tradition of color coding}, but Walmart and Target didn't seem to get the memo and only had either black or white baskets. I decided on black mostly because they seemed a little more sturdy, but also because they seemed a little more formal too...you know just in case I wanted to leave them sitting around full of laundry when we have guests over!

Now I had three identical black baskets, and I knew that would be an issue. It is is a lot harder for my kiddos to find their clean {wrinkled} clothes if they don't know which basket is theirs. My simple solution was to cut a few pieces of ribbon {blue, green, and orange} and tie them to the handles of the laundry baskets. Now everyone knows which basket is theirs without digging through a basket for 10 minutes while looking for clean underwear!

Do you have any simple solutions for making the dreaded task of laundry easier? Please share them with me....I need all the help I can get when it comes to the laundry!

Wordless Wednesday: Having a Ball

2011-11-09T09:01:00.004-06:00

My Very Own Mythbusters

2011-11-08T07:07:00.000-06:00

My boys don't watch a whole lot of tv. Besides early morning preschool shows, the occasional DVR'd episode of Tom & Jerry, and a new AFV here and there, they would honestly rather be outside running around in the yard! The one exception to that rule is MythBusters...they would give up playtime outside to watch MythBusters with their daddy any day of the week. We usually watch as a family {since it is a more adult show and you have to be careful about commercials}, and I love how much they love a show that is teaching them stuff!

Henry came home last week asking about an experiment we saw on an episode of MythBusters years ago. They had apparently tried out this myth at school, and he was dying to try it at home!

Here's a clip just in case you haven't seen this fun Diet Coke and Mentos experiment:

So last weekend, we picked up a few 2 liter Diet Cokes and a roll of Mentos at the store, and headed to the backyard to test out this myth!

The boys had so much fun doing this, and I think they may have learned a little something too...at least maybe Henry did, Grant was too worried about trying to drink the spray of Diet Coke:) This was a fun experiment that kept the kiddos entertained for the cost of a few bottles of soda and some candy! If you haven't ever done this experiment with your kiddos, you should try it sometime!

Thankful Photo Decor

2011-11-07T08:55:00.002-06:00

I finally got around to changing out the three frames in my kitchen that I use for holiday decorations. I'm kind of embarrassed to admit that the same finger-painted Christmas pictures stayed in the frames for a year or two before I changed it out a few weeks before Christmas last year for THIS. Then I put THIS Easter decor in the frames and it stayed there until now....yep, I had Easter decor in my house all the way through October. But I am making up for it now with this cute Thankful Photo Decor.

I started out by opening up a file in Photoshop Elements. I made my page 8x10 so that it would fit in the frame {and also so I could print it out as at a photo center if I wanted to}. I chose the picture of each kid that I wanted to use and placed it on the right side of the 8 X10 page. Then I added in the words "I am thankful for:" using a mix of fun fonts that I downloaded from kevinandamanda.com

I printed out the page at home {because I really didn't want to go to the store}, and I was pretty impressed with the quality of the picture that printed from my HP home printer.

I test fit each page into the frame to make sure it fit well, then I gave the kiddos a Sharpie and a few instructions.
****

Henry made a list along with a few numbered pictures....very analytic! You can tell he is the oldest for sure!

Grant was thankful for two things: his frend and toys....typical 6 year old boy I guess:)

Jason helped Eli who is apparently most thankful for pizza...I guess that explains why he wants to eat it 6 times a week!

I love seeing their cute faces along with the things that they are thankful for, but the best part of this project is that when Thanksgiving is over I will have something great to add to their memory books!

A Post About a Tweet

2011-11-04T06:30:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week, I tweeted:

Nature looking,

leaf picking,

picture taking

morning walk

with Eli.

Wordless Wednesday: Don't Cry Over Spilled Marshmallows

2011-11-02T06:30:00.000-05:00

Two Pictures on Tuesday

2011-11-01T08:04:00.001-05:00

I managed to get a few ~~more than 50~~ pictures of all three of my costume clad children yesterday afternoon before trick or treating started. Grant was feeling much better {thanks for all the get well wishes}, which I'm sure you can tell since he let me paint his nose with "sunscreen" and put his hair in a ~~fauxhawk~~ mohawk. Our little shark didn't quite understand that his fin was on his back so he needed to turn sideways for the pictures....otherwise he would just looked like a little boy in a gray sweatsuit!

We took the boys trick or treating to a few houses in my aunt's neighborhood...and Jason & I only had to carry the boys' surfboards about half of the time:) That is one major downfall of having big props that go along with your costume...but for some reason we seem to have props every year!

A Shark and Two Surfer Dudes:

I hope you all had a safe and fun Halloween...now on to Thanksgiving!

Monster Brownies & Halloween Costumes

2011-10-31T08:43:00.001-05:00

I saw these SUPER cute Monster Brownies over at Amanda's Cookin' last year...and I have been waiting for a reason to make them ever since! I can't remember why I didn't make them for Halloween last year, but I knew they would be the perfect treat to take to our annual Halloween gathering this year!

I started with a box brownie mix. I know a lot of people who say they LOVE homemade brownies, but I've never made homemade brownies {and I've tried lots of times} that taste as good as Duncan Hinds Chewy Fudge brownies! I mixed my brownies according to the chewy {NEVER cake-like} instructions, let them cool, and then cut them into squares and rectangles. Then I made a quick icing from powdered sugar, water, and green food coloring. I piped a border around the the edge of each brownie, let it harden, and filled in the inside with the same icing. Then I got busy making some monsters with M&M's, mini marshmallows, licorice, and colored icing. Pretty cute, SUPER easy, and the perfect treat for the kiddos to help with! Make sure to head over and check out Amanda's Monster Brownies...they are WAY cuter than mine:)

Here's a BIG ~~little~~ sneak peek of the boys' Halloween costumes for this year: A shark and a surfer dude!

You may notice that we are a man ~~surfer dude~~ down...that's because Grant has been sick since Friday. I finally took him to the doctor Sunday afternoon {thank goodness for after-hour and weekend sick appointments}, and he has pneumonia! Needless to say, he wasn't feeling up for costume night at Awana's last night! He started on antibiotics yesterday, and he is already feeling a ton better. I'm hoping to get a picture of all three boys in the costumes this afternoon...and I'm hoping Grant is feeling well enough to trick or treat at a couple of houses too!

Have a safe and HAPPY Halloween!

Shutterfly: Christmas Cards & So Much More!

2011-10-29T10:23:00.004-05:00

Last year on my blog, I raved about how much I love Shutterfly! I loved them even more after I got my 50 free Christmas cards in the mail and I saw how awesome they were...seriously the best quality cards I have seen in my 6 years of ordering photo Christmas cards! So I'm going to spend a little time this year telling you about how great Shutterfly really is....and then I might just tell you how you can get some free cards too:)

Here are a few of my favorite photo cards from this year...though it is pretty hard to top our Shutterfly card from last year!

Can you tell that I love the look of a square card:) Now I need to get busy picking out clothes and planning a photo session!

I love the great quality cards that Shutterfly offers for the holidays, but did you also know you can get some really awesome photo gifts to give to aunts, uncles, and grandparents! My mom has already requested a photo book of my boys as a Christmas present for this year:) I'm fine with that, because I know she will love it....and I will have a great time designing it on Shutterfly's website.

If you are planning a holiday party in the coming months, you can check out the great selection of invitations that Shutterfly has on their websites too! I'm thinking it would be really fun to host a cookie swap, and I would love to send out some of these fun invitations:

I'm off to browse Shutterfly's amazing selection of cards, and try to make a decision about which card to chose for this year!
Which Shutterfly Christmas card do you like best?

*I received a code for 25 free Christmas cards from Shutterfly for sharing about their cards with you. All opinions are my own. If you have a blog and you want to join their blogger program, click HERE.*

Friday Flashback: Candy Corn Edition

2011-10-28T09:23:00.001-05:00

I love decorating with stuff that can be used for multiple seasons and holidays. I love that instead of sitting in the attic for 11 months out of the year, that I can change some of my decor up and use it year round. So when I started working on new decorations for Halloween/fall I knew I could figure out a way to makes something that would work for Christmas, Valentine's Day, and maybe even Easter.

I started with some clear glass bottles that I have been saving for three years. I knew at some point I would find a good use for them:)

I used my Cricut and cut out some vinyl letters.

I used some transfer paper to attach the letters to the clear glass bottles.

I lined the bottles up to make sure that the letters were even...the "d" is a little high, but not enough to worry about.

I spray painted the lids white so they would match almost any holiday decor.

Then I filled the bottles up with CANDY CORN...

...and lined them up on my kitchen counter.

This was a SUPER inexpensive project...all I really bought was the candy corn. Now when fall is over and Christmas decorations start going up, all I will have to do is empty out the candy corn and add in some red, green, and white M &M's!

**This is a post from last year that has been one of my most popular through the year. I actually have the same jars sitting on my counter right now...they just aren't filled with candy!**

Trick or Treat, Smell my Feet! Halloween Shirts for a Trio

2011-10-27T08:44:00.001-05:00

I love a good holiday shirt! {You've all seen my past 4th of July, Disney, birthday, Halloween, and Thanksgiving shirts:)} And I love a funny set of holiday shirts even more...especially for Halloween! So instead of making my normal initial tees {that my boys have way to many of anyway}, I decided to make some fun "trick or treat, smell my feet" Halloween shirts for my boys this year! I think they are pretty cute...Jason thinks I'm weird! The boys love them and really that is all that matters!

I started with some fabric from Hobby Lobby and a few white t-shirts. I printed out my words{I used the font Smiley Monster which is one of my new favs} in mirror image.

I used spray adhesive to attach the words to the backside of my fabric with the printed side of the word facing out. A little complicated, but it makes cutting the letters a lot easier.

I cut out the letters, squaring off any of the edges that seemed like they might be hard to sew....I've been sewing for a while, but curves and circles still give me trouble:)

My original plan was to just sew the letters onto the shirts, but when I laid them out on the white shirts they were really hard to read.

I pulled a little bit of black felt from my fabric stash and decided that they looked 100 times better against the black fabric. I simple cut the felt big enough for the letters, sewed the letters onto the felt, then sewed around the edges of the felt to attach it to the shirt. I also used my monogram machine and some orange thread to add the words "smell my" to Eli's shirt.

Now I just need to find the time to finish making their Halloween costumes!

Wordless Wednesday: Praise in the Park

2011-10-26T09:09:00.002-05:00

Sweet Potato Pecan Dessert

2011-10-25T08:37:00.000-05:00

Last week, I shared a picture of my abundant supply of sweet potatoes and I asked for your suggestions on what to make with them. I got a ton of great ideas {like sweet potato fries} that I am planning on trying...but first I had to make this yummy dessert that I found on Pinterest. The original recipe is called Pumpkin Pecan Dessert and it is from a scrumptious blog called Glorious Treats! I know that pumpkins and sweet potatoes aren't the same thing, but they are pretty much interchangeable in recipes...at least they are for me. So I took the original recipe and simply switched out the pumpkin for my sweet potatoes, and I came up with Sweet Potato Pecan Dessert!

Ingredients:

4-5 medium sweet potatoes, baked

1 can (12 oz) evaporated milk

3 eggs

3/4 cup sugar

pumpkin pie spice or cinnamon to taste

1 boxed yellow cake mix

1 1/2 cups chopped pecans

3/4 cup butter, melted

Directions:

1. Bake your sweet potatoes at 350 until tender. Scoop out the insides. You will need about 15 oz of sweet potato for this recipe.

2. In a large bowl add the first 5 ingredients, and stir to combine.

3. Pour sweet potato mixture into 9" x 13" dish that has been sprayed with cooking spray.

4. Sprinkle dry cake mix evenly over the sweet potato layer.

5. Add chopped pecans.

6. Pour melted butter over top.

7. Bake 50-60 minutes on 350.

Top with whipped topping or ice cream before serving.

Adapted from Glorious Treats who got the recipe from the Betty Crocker Holiday Recipes booklet

Homemade Halloween Costume Ideas for Boys

2011-10-21T06:30:00.000-05:00

I love Halloween!

The weather, the candy, the fall festivals, the decorations, but most of all I love a great homemade Halloween costume! I know that some people just don't have the time or the skill to make homemade costumes, but I love the challenge of it...even though it really isn't as challenging as some people think. I have made homemade costumes for my boys every year since Henry's first Halloween in 2004...that's a total of 15 Halloween costumes! They have been everything from a scarecrow to a caveman, and they have all been homemade! For the most part I use inexpensive fabrics {like felt} and most of the costumes are held together with hot glue.

I decided to share a few pictures of some of our past homemade Halloween costumes {and a few details about how to make the costumes} with the hope that it will encourage a few of you to try and make some homemade costumes this year. They will save you a ton of money and create a ton of great memories too!

*KNIGHTS*

Last year the boys were knights. I used white & grey felt, blue cotton material, and some silver sparkly trim to make the costumes...and it was all put together with hot glue. I basically cut out a rectangle big enough for each boy and then cut out a neck hole. The side were held together with ties {look closely at Eli's} that went through a hole on each side of the costume. The boys worn grey thermal underwear underneath and the the helmets came from the dollar section at Target!

*CAVEMEN AND A DINOSAUR*

The dinosaur costume was a hand me down that Grant had worn a few years ago. This was sewn using a Simplicity sewing pattern {see below for more details about the pattern}. It was one of my first big sewing projects, so I was glad it was worn more than once:) Henry and Grant's Cavemen costumes were made out of {really cheap} fake fur. I cut a basic rectangle out and then sewed up the sides and cut out a neck hole. Henry asked for a one armed costume which was a little more complicated, but still pretty easy. I made boot covers using their shoes as a template...and Jason helped me out with those!

Their necklaces where made with big wooden beads from the craft section of Hobby Lobby and the boys helped me make them. I tied a little twine around the boys waists and in this picture you can see the fun edge that I cut on the bottom to make their costumes look a little more primitive.

*SUPERHEROES*

I think these were some of the boys most favorite costumes ever...especially since they still play with them sometimes! I made the capes out of felt and {some kind of shiny} silky material. They were sewn together, but you can easily make a no sew cape with material that doesn't fray and some iron on adhesive for the emblem. Their shirts {I used two per costume to make the emblem and their belt} and pants came from Walmart and they were only $3 each.

I even made Eli a little superhero costume by sewing a small cape onto the back of a onesie and adding a belt {with an E} to the front of it.

*PIRATES*

These costumes were really simple to make, and they were no sew! I got black sweat pants for the boys and cut the leg holes kind of jagged. I probably spent less than $5 at the fabric store for the yellow fabric and the red and white striped fabric. I simple cut all the pieces to length for each boy and then tied them on! The pirate accessories came from the dollar section at Target, and if you look closely they even had a gold earring {that was clipped onto their headpiece not their ear}.

*DINOSAURS*

This is the one {and only} year that I have sew the boys entire costumes...and it was a lot of work! They were totally worth it though {especially since Eli wore the green dinosaur costume again}! This was made with a Simplicity pattern that was actually pretty easy to follow. Here's a link to the pattern { 2506 }just in case anyone is interested.

*SCARECROW*

For Henry's first Halloween he was a scarecrow. He was an adorable little scarecrow and this was a really cheap and easy costume to put together. I used a pair of overalls from a thrift store and stitched on a few patches. Then I hot glued some raffia around the leg holes. I braided a few pieces of raffia for a belt and made a cute hat out of some black felt. Add a plaid shirt and a little face paint and you've got a cute homemade scarecrow!

I know that it may be easier to just buy a costume at the store, but think of all the fun memories that you can make by doing something homemade for you kiddos this year...not to mention the money you can save! There is still more than a week left before Halloween, so head to the craft store and start working on some fun homemade Halloween costumes!

**If you do decide to try one of my costume ideas {or if this post encouraged you to try any homemade costume} send me some pics or a link to your blog...I would love to feature a few homemade costumes here!**

Sweet Potatoes

2011-10-20T06:00:00.000-05:00

Lots and lots of sweet potatoes!

I bought this bag of sweet potatoes for $6 from a man selling them on the side of the road last week. I'm guessing there are probably close to 50 sweet potatoes in this brown bag that the man called "the small bag"....he was also selling a larger bag that had twice as many sweet potatoes in it!

I came home with grand plans to make some yummy baked sweet potatoes and maybe some kind of pie, but my bag of sweet potatoes is still sitting untouched on the kitchen counter. We were out of town most of the weekend, and Jason has been working long hours...or at least those are the excuses that I tell myself when I start feeling bad for not cooking any of them yet:) Another reason I haven't cooked them is because it has been so hot here lately and sweet potatoes just seem like a cold weather kind of food to me.

Luckily our temps dropped almost 40 degrees overnight on Tuesday and Jason is supposed to have normal work hours for the rest of the week...so no more excuses! I will make something with {at least a few of} my sweet potatoes, I'm just not sure what!?!

Do you have any great sweet potato recipes that your family loves? Please share them with me! I'm hoping to try out a few different recipes and blog about them next week.

Wordless Wednesday: An A-MAZE-ing Field Trip

2011-10-19T09:03:00.000-05:00

Click here to see Henry's A-MAZE-ing field trip from last year:)

Jack O Lantern Waffles

2011-10-18T06:15:00.000-05:00

What's more fun than colorful waffles? Colorful waffles that smile back at you of course! If you've been around my blog long you know that I have quite an obsession with FUN waffles, and today I'm sharing my newest fall waffle creation:

To make these smiling waffles, all you need is a waffle mix of you choice, orange food coloring, and mini chocolate chips.

After you mix the batter according to the package directions, add a pretty good amount of orange food coloring {I always use Wilton gels because they make the color a lot more vibrant than liquid food coloring}.

Stir in the food coloring and add more as needed.... You want to make sure your jack o' lantern is a vibrant orange, not a pastel color.

After your batter is mixed up and you've got the perfect shade of orange, get your mini chocolate chips ready. I found it was easiest to pour them in a small bowl. That way I could scoop them up with a spoon and add them to my waffle batter quickly.

Pour the orange waffle batter onto your greased and heated waffle iron. Using a spoon {it gives you a little more control of the those crazy mini chips}, add the mini chocolate chips onto your waffle in the pattern of a jack o' lantern....eyes, nose, and big smiling mouth.

When your jack o' lantern waffle comes out of the waffle iron, it will be smiling back at you!

I had three hungry boys waiting for waffles so I didn't have a ton of time to decorate these after they came off the waffle iron, but you could add some green gummies to the top of the waffle as a stem and leaves to make them even more fun!

Tent Camping, Bulldogs, and Football

2011-10-17T10:15:00.001-05:00

Twelve hours is probably the cap on the amount of time that I ever want to spend camping in a tent....and that is exactly what we did this weekend. After deciding {very last minute} to take the Henry and Grant to a Mississippi State football game, I got busy trying to find a hotel room. The only problem was that there was NOTHING available within 100 miles of Starkville! Lucky for us, my grandparents were staying in their motor home at a campground about 30 minutes south of MS State....so we loaded up our tent and sleeping bags and headed out for a night of tent camping.

We didn't get to the campground until almost 9 pm Friday night, so I don't have any pictures of the tent going up...but here are few of the boys helping Jason disassemble the tent the next morning:) We had a pretty good night in the tent, but I'm definitely bringing an air mattress if we ever tent camp again!

After the tent and sleeping bags were loaded up and we had said our goodbyes {and thanks you for the free place to sleep} to my grandparents, we headed to see the Bulldogs. Henry and Grant got their picture taken with a statue of a bulldog...

...and a real one too!

After our walking tour {aka we parked so far from the football field that we saw half the campus on the way to the stadium} of the campus, the boys got to play on some inflatable for a while and get their faces painted.

Then we headed to our seats {decked out in maroon} to cheer on the MS State Bulldogs. The Bulldogs ended up losing in the last few minutes of the game 14-12...but it was a great game and the boys had a really great time!

We're hoping {okay mostly me because I don't want to sleep in a tent again any time soon} that our Airstream will be ready for football season next year, and maybe Eli will be old enough to join us for the game too:)

Wordless Wednesday: At the End of the Rainbow

2011-10-12T10:26:00.003-05:00

Hey, What's That?

2011-10-11T12:18:00.001-05:00

Yes, there is a sticky frog stuck to my ceiling.

Yes, it has been there since yesterday.

Yes, my house full of boys thinks that having a sticky frog stuck to the ceiling is hilarious.

Yes, I took pictures of the sticky frog to share on my blog.

Yes, I am low on good blogging material so instead of something interesting, you get multiple pictures of a sticky frog.

Have a great day! And try not to get any sticky frogs stuck to your ceiling:)

Friday Flashback: Food Edition

2011-10-07T07:40:00.000-05:00

PUMPKIN JIGGLERS
**It's another Flashback Post! This is a fun recipe that I shared last year. We are definitely going to be making these again this year because they were a huge hit with my boys! Enjoy**

Jello Jigglers

& pumpkin cookie cutters

make SUPER easy

and SUPER fun

fall treats

for everyone to eat!

What kind of fun Halloween/fall snacks have you been making?!?

I Gave Into the Missoni Hype...A Little Late!

2011-10-06T06:30:00.000-05:00

I know I am way behind the curve here considering most people were storming the doors of Target more than 3 weeks ago, but after quite a few trips past the {very small selection} of Missoni merchandise at my local Target I finally gave in. I bought a candle and a journal. I know big spender, right?!?

Honestly I just wasn't really a big fan of the majority of the stuff that I saw. A lot of the pieces seemed either way too retro or way too Southwestern for my taste. I will say that I LOVE the zig-zag {aka chevron}, but some of the the color combos just don't fit my style....except for the black and white {which is what I ended up buying}.

I did LOVE this bike, and these fun boots that my friend Carrie bought are SUPER cute too. There were a few other pieces that probably would have considered buying {like a scarf, a pair of flats, or some cute socks}, but when I finally decided t~~hat I desperately needed to have a least one Missoni piece~~ to buy something, the pickin' were slim and the black and white things were all I could talk myself into buying. I do think that a lot of the little girl's stuff was cute....but little girl's clothes are never on my shopping list for some reason:)

For now, I am SUPER happy with my cute zig-zag candle that blends pretty well into my living room decor. It is black and white so it pretty much matches anything:)

What do you think of the Missoni for Target line...like it or loathe it?

Wordless Wednesday: Flying with Pan Am

2011-10-05T07:16:00.000-05:00

Anybody want to take a guess at what his airplane is made from?

Caramel Apples

2011-10-04T08:33:00.001-05:00

I've shared more than a few apple recipes on my blog over the years {Inside Out Caramel Apples, Apple Sandwiches, Sauteed Apples}. My apple recipes are sometimes created out of necessity because I buy way too many apples and then don't eat them before they start to get a little mushy. But last week I actually bought a ton of apples on purpose...to make caramel apples for Grant's entire 1st grade class! Yes, when his teacher asked us parents to send in a fun apple treat last week, I didn't take the easy route and send apple chips or even a store bought apple pie. Nope, I decided to make 30 {yummy, gooey, peanut covered} caramel apples instead:) Crazy? Maybe a little bit, but they were really fun to make and even more fun to eat! And yes I made a few extra to keep at home:) Here's my step by step just in case you want to make some of these yummy treats:

Wash, dry, and insert sticks into apples. I put the sticks in the bottom of the apples because I found that they are a little more steady upside down:)

Open a ton of caramel squares. I used 3 14 oz bags of caramels and it was just about perfect to make 30 small-ish caramel apples.

Heat the caramel according to the package instructions, and then dip the apples in the warm caramel.

Add chopped peanuts to the dipped apple.

Place the apples on wax paper to cool and then enjoy...or send 27 of them to school:)

Have you ever made caramel apples?

Pinterest Inspiration: Football Door Hangers

2011-09-30T10:06:00.002-05:00

My craft {and recipe, decorating, photography, holiday, and party} to do list keeps getting longer and longer...mostly thanks to Pinterest! I am seriously pinning amazing ideas way faster than I can create them! A few weeks ago I pinned a really cute Football Door Hanger that I knew would be perfect on my front porch along with my Football Windsocks! I had all the supplies in my craft stash, I just kept putting off making them...until I finally convinced a few of my friends to come over for a craft day! We spent a few hours turning plain burlap into these adorable Football Door Hangers:

I don't have a step by step for you...mostly because I was dealing with Eli and trying to make four of these without getting too confused! {Check out Amanda's blog post to see her step by step.} They are actually really easy to make. We started by cutting out some plain burlap in the shape of a football, two footballs per door hanger. Then we spray painted one side of each burlap football with brown spray paint. After the paint was dry we added the fun painted embellishments to the piece that was going to be the front. You can also paint on two of the burlap footballs and make it reversible. My friend Tonya is apparently a great free-hand painter so she did the letters:) After the paint was dry, we layered two of the footballs together and then used a stapler to attach them to each other leaving one end open to stuff them. We added in a ribbon to the top to hang them with, stuffed them with plastic grocery bags, and closed up the hole using the stapler. Pretty easy and SUPER cute! That's one project I can mark off my {Pinterest} to do list!

Have you been working on any Pinterest inspired projects lately?

Wordless Wednesday: Our Day So Far

2011-09-28T10:56:00.000-05:00

I Learned All I Know About Cobblers Thanks to The Pioneer Woman

2011-09-26T09:48:00.000-05:00

Cobblers. For some reason everyone else seems to make amazing fruit desserts, and I just can't figure it out. I admitted to this last year when I shared a great Cherry Crunch recipe. And even though I did figure out one fruit dessert, I still had trouble with cobbler...that is until I watch the new Pioneer Woman cooking show on Food Network. She shared an easy recipe for Blackberry Cobbler that is apparently magic because this weekend I made the most scrumptious peach cobbler using her recipe {and some fresh peaches my hubby picked up for me on his way home from a business trip}. Besides the fact that this is a really great cobbler recipe, how cool is it that Ree is a blogger turned tv show host! Call me crazy but I think that is just awesome. Now on to the recipe.

Fresh Peach Cobbler

adapted from The Pioneer Woman's Blackberry Cobbler

Ingredients:

1 cup self rising flour

1 cup sugar

1 cup milk

1/2 stick butter, melted

6-8 fresh peaches, peeled and sliced

cinnamon and sugar for the top

Directions:

Mix together the flour, sugar, and milk. Stir in the melted butter. Pour the batter into a buttered 10X13 baking dish. Add cut up peaches {or whatever kind of fruit you want to try} on top of the batter. Top the whole cobbler with a sprinkle of cinnamon and sugar. Bake at 350 for about an hour. Cool slightly and serve with vanilla ice cream.

Friday Flashback: Craft Edition

2011-09-23T07:21:00.000-05:00

**I haven't been very crafty latley, so I'm sharing a little flashback craft. This fun Mod Podge project was originally posted back in November of 2009.**
*******
Fall Mod Podge Pumpkins

This is how our project ended:

Despite the major mess and the {now} dry and scratchy carpet, our Thanksgiving/fall pumpkins turned out SUPER cute!

Just in case you want to make a HUGE mess and some SUPER cute pumpkins...here is the list of supplies and steps we followed to make them.

*******************************

Plastic pumpkins {mine were $1 at Walmart}

Scrapbook Paper {8 sheets for $1 at Target}

Mod Podge

Paint Brushes

*********************************
Tear scrapbook paper into small pieces

Attach the paper to the pumpkin and continue to coat it with Mod Podge until all the paper is wet and stuck to the pumpkin really well. This is the messy part, because the only way to make the paper stick really well is to work it with your hands! Eli and I worked on some painting while Henry and Grant were finishing up their pumpkins. These SUPER cute and oh so chubby handprints are going to be turkeys and leaves once I get my paintpens after them! Just a little hint....be careful when painting with brown paint, because your kiddo might think it is chocolate and try to lick it off his hand! :)

Then use a foam paintbrush to apply a coat of Mod Podge all over the pumpkins and let them dry.

Our pumpkins {coated with Mod Podge} drying on the table...picture taken by Henry {because I still had a two inch layer of MP on my hands}!

Our finished Thanksgiving/Fall Pumpkins!

*Random Thoughts of a SUPERMOM!*

Planning is Half the Fun

This Time Last Year

Sonic Drink Holder Valentine Gift Box

Collecting or Hoarding?

I Love You More Than Chocolate Marshmallow Hearts

Project Airstream: A Shelf, Updated Bathroom, and All the Walls

Football, That Stupid Pig, Ice Cream Sundaes, and Airstream Progress

Valentine Mailbox Magnets

Groundhog Day Craft and Recipe Roundup

Groundhog Day Donuts

January Recap Via Instagram

Chocolate-Covered Strawberry Waffles

Play-Doh Valentines with Printable Labels

Valentine Chalkboard Candy Boxes

Meet Phoebe the Puppy

Let's Go Fishing

100 Days

Just Some Rambling

January Un-decorating & Redecorating

One Word

Top 10 Posts of 2011

Oh My Crafts Vinyl

A Few Days Late

Upcycled Wooden Nativity

Christmas Initial Tee's

Candy Cane Cupcakes

Snowman Juice Boxes

Wordless Wednesday: Joy Peace Hope Christmas Card

2011 Reading Fair Projects

Nutter Butter Snowman Snacks

Nativity Garden Flag

Oral-B Stages III & Crest and Oral-B Pro-Health FOR ME Cars 2 Viewing Party!

What's His Name?

Making a List...

Sweet and Spicy Almonds

Guest Posting at Serenity Now

Mini Muffins Make Me Smile

Directions

Miscellany Monday

Happy Thanksgiving...

Scrapbooking Made Easy! My Memories Suite Giveaway!

Gobble, Gobble: Turkey Waffles

Pilgrim and Indian Initial Tees

Wordless Wednesday: Peanuts and Pajamas

Using Actions for Photoshop Elements to Edit Your Photos

Friday Flashback: Craft Edition

Organizing the Laundry

Wordless Wednesday: Having a Ball

My Very Own Mythbusters

Thankful Photo Decor

A Post About a Tweet

Wordless Wednesday: Don't Cry Over Spilled Marshmallows

Two Pictures on Tuesday

Monster Brownies & Halloween Costumes

Shutterfly: Christmas Cards & So Much More!

Friday Flashback: Candy Corn Edition

Trick or Treat, Smell my Feet! Halloween Shirts for a Trio

Wordless Wednesday: Praise in the Park

Sweet Potato Pecan Dessert

Homemade Halloween Costume Ideas for Boys

Sweet Potatoes

Wordless Wednesday: An A-MAZE-ing Field Trip

Jack O Lantern Waffles

Tent Camping, Bulldogs, and Football

Wordless Wednesday: At the End of the Rainbow

Hey, What's That?

Friday Flashback: Food Edition

I Gave Into the Missoni Hype...A Little Late!

Wordless Wednesday: Flying with Pan Am

Caramel Apples

Pinterest Inspiration: Football Door Hangers

Wordless Wednesday: Our Day So Far

I Learned All I Know About Cobblers Thanks to The Pioneer Woman

Friday Flashback: Craft Edition

Random Thoughts of a SUPERMOM!