Garnish!

I am SUPER excited!

I follow this wonderful blog:

And every once in a while, Nester host GIVEAWAY DAY! It is a whole day filled with amazing giveaways, one every hour to be exact!

This year, I think I entered everyone single one...never imagining that with all the hundreds of comments, I would be lucky enough to win.

Well, I was wrong!

I did WIN!

I was completely surprised and SUPER excited when I read the list of winners, and saw my name beside #11!

I won a $25 gift certificate to GARNISH!

So now, I get to stop drooling over all the cute stuff in their shop, and actually buy something!

Like these cute paper straws:

These adorable berry baskets:

And these SUPER chic clear boxes:
Have you won any giveaways lately!?!
Don't forget I will be hosting FREE 4 All Friday this week, so that is one more giveaway one lucky person will win:)

Not Me! Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.
******************************** Do you remember my last Not Me! Monday post...the one where I did NOT buy two bags of M&M's for my cookie jar?!? Well, after that post, I did NOT go to Target and buy 6 more bags to try and fill up my cookie jar! Those six bags did NOT fill it up, and we did NOT promptly start to empty it!
I did NOT tell my husband this week "I do not speak NERD", when he started trying to explain something to me by using a Sci-fi movie as a reference! Umm...Hello, I 'm girl! If you want me to understand something I'm pretty sure you should use a chick flick movie reference instead:)

Eli does NOT have the words 'yes' and 'no' mixed up! This is NOT SUPER cute, but also SUPER confusing! It is NOT already difficult to communicate with a toddler, and his word confusion is NOT making it twice as hard! When I ask him if he wants a cookie, he does NOT say 'no' and shake his head side to side!

Fork and Spoon Redo

Back in January I found some great deals at a resale shop that was going out of business. You may remember the lovely wooden fork and spoon from this post. Well, I finally got around to revamping them. The total cost for this project was $8.50!

I paid $2.50 for the set and then spent $3.00 on a can of primer and $3.00 on a can of Black Satin spraypaint. I sanded down the fork and spoon, wiped them down, and sprayed them with a good coat of primer.Then I gave them each two coats of black spray paint to match my kitchen countertops.
I used left over gingham scraps to cover up the strange totem pole faces, and to hang the fork and spoon.
I think they make a nice addition to my kitchen decor...quirky and fun!
{Please ignore the messy kitchen...I took these pics while I was making my rainbow cupcakes! }
To finish up the area I am going to buy the letters E, A, and T to hang above the fork and spoon! Now I just have to decide if I want to paint the letters black, green {the same as the kitchen}, or maybe Mod Podge some paper or fabric on them.

Photography Class Shots

{Cloudy Day 1}{Cloudy Day 2}
{Sunny Day 1}
{Sunny Day 2}

I am taking a {photography} continuing education class through the local community college. It is a four week class that teaches the basics of photography and how to use your camera. So far I have learned some great tips and tricks, and I have added a ton of things to my photography wish list!

These are some of the shots from last week's homework assignment! The teacher {a local photographer} said that the middle two shots were my best.

So far I still have a lot of questions, but next week some professional are coming in help us learn all the functions of our camera! I am hoping to learn a lot during that meeting.

Have you ever taken a photography class, or do you just learn from experience?!?

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UPDATED: I used random.org to select two winners from my SafetyTat giveaway, and the winners are:

Julie from Foursons

&

Amanda from Popping Out One Letter at a Time

Congrats ladies!

St. Patty's Day!

We don't normally make a big deal about St. Patrick's Day. I mean, we wear green so we don't get pinched, but other than that it just isn't a big holiday for us. BUT, when I saw these cupcakes in Family Fun magazine, I knew that I had to make them! They were pretty easy to make {though very time consuming} and the end product is well worth the effort!

I started with a cake mix and store bought frosting.
I used my Wilton food color gels to color about 2/3 cup of batter with each color of the rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. I mixed the cake batter and color together in plastic cups. I used white icing {as clouds} and topped each cupcake off with a gold coin. And the colors turned out amazing! I think one of my favorite parts was the rainbow left on the cupcake wrapper! After making a few rainbow mini cupcakes and a few rainbow regular cupcakes, I got lazy and just did mini cupcakes in solid colors.

I figured I could line them up to look like a rainbow:)

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The boys and I also made some SUPER cute shamrocks! I cut three hearts per person with my Cricut and hot glued them together in the shape of a shamrock and the glued on a stem. Then the boys used crepe paper and decorated their shamrocks! SUPER easy and we made it with stuff that we had around the house.

How do you celebrate St. Patrick's Day?