Valentine Mailbox Magnets

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!

Linking up here..
Tatertots and Jello
Serenity Now
Someday Crafts
Skip to my Lou

Groundhog Day Craft and Recipe Roundup

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

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

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

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!

Linking up here..
Tatertots and Jello
Serenity Now
Decor Chic
Someday Crafts
Skip to my Lou