Pumpkinbutts

Homemade Bath Bombs

2012-01-27T16:38:00.000-08:00

Whaaaat a craft post, from me? I bet you didn't see that coming! :)

I've recently become Obsessed (<-see that capitol O? That's for extra emphasis!) with Lush products. If you don't know what Lush is, it's a sort of hippieish cosmetic/bath products store. All of their products are handmade with no preservatives or any junk, and almost everything is amazing.

Herein lies my dilemma. I do not live anywhere near a Lush, and not only are their products pricey (though well worth it!) so is shipping. I loathe paying for shipping.

So I decided that I would make my own! I spent a few weeks gathering supplies, some I had to order online, then spent last night making my lushlike creations. They were so easy, and so worth the effort! The fresher these bad boys are the more they fizz, so mine are super fizzy and fabulous. The fragrance I chose is called Monkey Farts, and while a little crass it's a lovely blend of banana, strawberry, kiwi tropicalness. Yum!

Here is the simple recipe, though making these is more of a process than a recipe:

1/2 cup citric acid
1/2 cup Epson Salt
1 cup baking soda
tap water in a spray bottle
mold of some sort (I used round Christmas ornament halves!)
Gel food coloring

Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl, make sure there are no clumps! add in your fragrance and color to your liking. Mix well. Spritz on two to three sprays of water and mix in well. The grab some in your fist and drop into the bowl. If it lands in the bowl with out breaking, you're ready to mold. If it breaks, repeat the spritzing.
Once you get it to drop without breaking, fill both of your mold haves tightly, then add extra mixture between and press together as hard as you can. Don't twist! The hardened ball should easily pop out of the mold.

Allow to dry for at least 24 hours (though you can use these right away!) before packaging.

I suggest watching some video on bath bomb making on YouTube before you dive in. You'll get a feel of the mixing technique and how the mixture should look before you mold. Have fun!

Around the World in 80 Dinners

2011-12-13T10:35:00.000-08:00

Probably more than 80, actually! My husband and I have decided to start a new weekly tradition, instead of going out to eat, we will be making a dinner from a different country once a week. This was actually the H's idea, after he found an Italian cooking channel on Yahoo and spent nearly two days watching the chef make all sorts of delcious dishes.

So, we began our "journey" with Italy! I came home to a roast chicken and pancetta risotto! Quite impressive if you consider that the boy had never cooked either of those things in his life, and they both turned out delicious.

This week it's my turn, and I've chosen the bordering country of France. If you have any good French dishes, please let me know! I have to make it by Saturday and I haven't even begun my search.

Like I Forgot Somethin'

2011-11-30T11:33:00.000-08:00

Hello Friends! It's been a long time and a much needed break, with all the hectic activity that's been my life for the past 6 months. To make a long story short, I shall tell it in bullet form

June- Moved out of our house to a town three hours away
July- I Couldn't find a job in time, came back to work. H stayed behind to work, so I got my own apartment.
Sept- Had to kick out the renter from my house due to breach of contract
Oct- Moved back into my house, continuing to look for work in San Jose
Nov - Husband was laid off from his job in San Jose, he moved back too!

Today:
That's my new, fully functional oven!

So, after a crazy experiment in relocating to another town, we are both home and things are returning to normal for me and mine ;) And baking commences this evening, so expect to see me a little more often! I've definitely missed you guys!

Updates and a break.

2011-07-19T13:32:00.000-07:00

Hello!

As you may or may not have noticed, I never did come back and start updating on June 10th. I'm really not situated quite yet, and since I've yet to find a job in our new location, I'm currently commuting 3 hours to work and only going home on the weekends.

There are no crafts. There is no baking.

Maybe someday, if things ever get to be where I want them to be again, I will be back. As it is currently, I don't see myself updating my dear blog very often.

I have to say wow and thank you so much to the fact that I have 100 blog followers. That's amazing and I love you all, and I'm still reading your blogs.

p.s. My great nephew Marcelo was born on June. 8th and is the cutest thing that there ever was ;)

Changes

2011-05-24T15:29:00.000-07:00

Sorry that I have been so quiet lately, but I am in the process of relocating to the Bay Area, and all of my craft and baking stuff has been packed away! Hopefully after I'm settled a bit, sometime after June 10th, I'll be back :)

Bassinet

2011-05-10T08:53:00.001-07:00

Finally, the finished bassinet and quilt! It took my mom and I a few weeks and lots of hours to get this done (in the knick of time!)And here is my super pregnant niece (three weeks to go!) with the bassinet.

Sadly I didn't get any pictures of the inside, but my mom sewed it so that the green flannel lining it was tufted (so cute!) and there was a bumper along the front made out of the jungle fabric.

Now all I have to do is wait for this baby :)

Dusting off the old sew machine!

2011-05-03T08:58:00.000-07:00

Suddenly my craft desk feels very small!

Until last night, my poor sew machine had been banished to the shelf ever since I got my Cricut last September. I had to dust it off because this weekend is my Niece's baby shower (that's right folks, I'm going to be a 24 year old GREAT aunt! So weird, but I'm excited!). There is a wicker bassinet that has been in my family for 43 years, and almost every sibling, niece and nephew and a few friends and cousins has spent the first month or so of their life in it, and every baby gets new bassinet decor.
This baby's (still nameless, but a little boy!) nursery theme is jungle, so my Mom and I decided to go with that. After hunting through the fabric stores and coming home empty handed three times, we finally decided on a jungle baby print with green flannel lining and a jungly quilt. Yes I made up the word jungly. Deal with it.

So, I made the skirt that covers the legs last night.I can't wait to show you the completed bassinet. Heck, I can't wait to see it myself! It's going to be pretty stinking cute.

And tonight, I'm making (my first ever!) cheater quilt. I bought the top fully assembled at JoAnn's for 50% off, thanks to the nicest counter cutter I've ever encountered there (say that three times fast!) and I'm both nervous and excited to get started.I'm going to add satin tags along the edges of the quilt because I know how much little boys love silky things :)

Wish me luck!

The Camo Cake

2011-04-30T08:40:00.000-07:00

Last weekend my husband turned 25, and as is tradition, I had to make him an awesome cake! (see Last year and the year before).
This year he asked for chocolate, extra chocolately. One of the things that would make me a bad food blogger (if I were one) is that once I find a recipe that I like, I stick to it. But since this was a birthday cake I knew I couldn't use my old faithful Black Magic Cake recipe, and I opted to go with this Dark Chocolate cake that I had bookmarked awhile back.
I did use my old trusty Ganache, butter cream and fondant recipes, though.
I wanted to make this cake camo because, as some of you know, DH is a big bird hunting fan, and, like any good redneck, has a green truck, a brown dog, and lots of camo. (He doesn't wear it in public though, only for hunting! I'm thankful for the little things :)

This cake was *really* tasty. Now choosing which chocolate cake to make is going to be hard!

I love my office

2011-04-29T12:33:00.000-07:00

So, as many of you know, I am considered an "administrative professional" and Wednesday was administrative professionals day. Well, pretty much everyone in my office completely forgot (including me!), except for my student assistant Jaci, who placed this on my desk that afternoon:
Awww!

Anyways, today I came in to find a package from my supervisor Karen wrapped on my desk (along with a box of Jujyfruits, she knows me so well!):
How adorable are these pink and black tools in their adorable case?! I'm super excited.

I've had a paper piercer on my wishlist for quite awhile now, so I'm most excited about . Maybe having some pretty new tools will get me back in my craft room!

I have awesome coworkers :)

Something Different

2011-04-11T17:23:00.000-07:00

Aside from being Mini Eggs season (3 bags down, so far), Spring is when my yard really starts to come alive. The yard was the one thing that really sold us this house, and we LOVE it. It's a little worse for the wear since we got Bill, but the two of them (the yard and Bill) are starting to get used to each other, and I'm really happy with how it's looking now! I'm not gonna lie, though, that first year when Bill was a puppy the yard wept for it's future :) We had to remove most of the plants because he had a tendency to eat them, and some are poisonous to curious puppies.yeah, I have a creepy lawn gnome. He was less creepy when he was new...but oh well. Oh, and he's got brothers.

Anyways, we've been working (playing) in my yard all weekend, so I thought I would share some of the prettiness with you! I did also make a card (yes, just one lol) this weekend, but I'll save it for another post.

Looks like I need to get some slug poison around my tulips, the slugs are really going to town :(

Have a great week!

Birds nest cupcakes

2011-04-02T10:50:00.001-07:00

Anyone that knows me knows that Spring is Mini Eggs season for me. I don't care about anything else, but mini eggs.

On Thursday we finally got our oven fixed after a few weeks of it being non operational, so I had to celebrate with cupcakes! I had seen these cute cupcakes at a local shop where the baker had made tiny chicks out of mini eggs and put them on a nest of toasted coconut. Now, I didn't have the patience for the faces, but I thought eggs in a nest would be just as cute!
So, here are my recreations! They were super cute and tasty, and I'm beyond thrilled to have an oven again ;)

Those cupcake liners are from Paula Deen and they say "A balanced diet is a cupcake in each hand", lol! My mom bought them for me and I was excited to get a chance to use them.

I finally filled up my cupcake stand that I got for Christmas!

p.s. if anyone is local and wants to know the name of the business I got this idea from, shoot me an email or leave me a comment, and I'll email it to you! While I'd love to support her, I don't like to share with the interwebs exactly where I live~

Cranes for Kids

2011-03-30T12:35:00.000-07:00

Many of you probably saw this yesterday, but if you make a paper crane and post a photo to OshKoshbGosh's facebook wall, they'll send an article of clothing to a child in Japan.

Here are some simple instructions

This is such a great way to get involved, even if you are super busy this only takes a second and could mean the world to a kid (you never know...). I made mine using copy paper at my desk at work :)

Tuesday Treat: Lining an envelope

2011-03-29T10:00:00.000-07:00

It's my turn for a Tuesday Treat over at Card Cupids, and I made a little video that shows how I line the envelopes for my cards. This is my very last Tuesday Treat for the Card Cupids design team, I hope you enjoy!

Blog Love

2011-03-28T08:24:00.001-07:00

I thought I'd take a break from my normal card posting to share some blogs that I'm loving lately. I think they all deserve a little more attention (even if some have lots of followers!), so I thought I'd share and give you a way to kill time at work this week ;)

1. Scraps by Sissy - Laurie is the mom of a friend of mine, and I was thrilled to discover she was a card maker too. At first, Laurie was the only person other than me that I knew in real life who had a Cricut machine! I love Laurie's cards, they're so cute and detailed and she's always so positive on her blog.

2. Veronika's Blushing- This girl is super cute. I think she dresses adorably, and what I really love is that she wears stuff that I can wear. I adore fashion blogs, but if they're wearing hammer pants and Louboutins everyday, there's not much inspiration I can glean there!

3. 26 and counting - Another adorable girl with a wearable fashion blog. She's also a young professional, and I could wear everything she wears to work, so I love that. Plusalso she has great hair.

4. Paperhoot - Janet has made some of my absolute favorite cards using a Cricut that I've ever seen. She does very detailed work and it's always whimsical and adorable. Basically, I wish I had her talent!

5. Hobby Hopping - I know I've talked about Christy's blog before, but she's one of the most talented people I have ever met. I'm always thrilled when I see she has a new blog post (and when she started her blog I was soooo excited!), and it's never the same thing. She has so much variety in her work that I never get bored of her posts.

So there are five blogs that I adore, and always click on when I see they've made a new post. I hope you check them out and find them fun too!

Have a good week!

Scraplifter!

2011-03-24T08:33:00.001-07:00

A few weeks ago I watched Sarah, of Live, Love and Scrap's, youtube video where she made what I thought was the cutest card EVER. She used the new Scrappy Mom's Kids Incorporated set, along with the Sweet Treats cartridge, both of which I happen to have, so I knew I needed to make something similar.
Now, Sarah is amazing (if you've never watched her videos, you should) and she has a patience with her cards that I will probably never posses...so I could never duplicate it exactly. I would go nuts with all of those eensy details! So I did eliminate some of the details and make my cuts a little larger, but I love how my card turned out.

So, thank Sarah for the inspiration! I hope you continue to make videos for a long time :)

p.s. sorry for the crummy iPhone photo, apparently I've become too lazy to dig out my camera and cord lately!

Challenge: Spring with Scrappy Moms!

2011-03-20T11:08:00.000-07:00

I'm so happy Spring is here! This winter has not been a fun for me and my family, and we're very ready to move on to happier times and better weather ;)
This weeks challenge at Card Cupids is Spring Cards, and we're sponsored by the amazing and generous Scrappy Moms stamps. They sent us each a set of their new Kids Incorporated stamp sets and they are SO adorable! I really love these stamps.

Trust me, you WANT to enter this challenge, the winner gets a Kids Incorporated stamp set of their own!

a wee little update

2011-03-16T10:00:00.000-07:00

Remember a few weeks ago I posted that Monkey card for the Card Cupids challenge? I liked that card...but I didn't Luuuurve it. So I decided to play with it and doodle on it, and I'm much happier with it now.

I just thought I would share! Sometimes I'm not "finished" with things I think that I'm finished with :)

Challenge: Green Cards

2011-03-15T23:12:00.000-07:00

The challenge at Card Cupids this week is to come up with a Green colored card, which is the perfect challenge for St. Patty's day week.

Our awesome sponsor this week is Copic (!!!) and they sent us some really neat Spica glitter pens to use on our cards, I used mine on my leprechauns shoes, in his mouth, and on the sentiment. It's really hard to capture how amazing spica sparkle is, but if you look at my last week challenge card, his guitar is colored with the black spica and you can see it glitters gold.

This is a really easy challenge with an amazing prize, so I hope you enter!

New Challenge at Card Cupids

2011-03-09T09:24:00.001-08:00

This weeks challenge at Card Cupids is anything goes, which is the easiest of all challenges! I made my card really simple, using the stamp Max by our sponsor The Stamping Boutique. The back ground paper is DCVW and the ribbon is from Target's $1 spot, the stamp is from Michael's $1 spot. I find my self using that stamp on most of my boy themed cards because you can mix and match the words "hero" "star" "guitar" "super" and "rock" for a bunch of different variations that are all boy :)
The guitar is colored in with a black spica pen and is super glittery in real life, I just love the way it turned out.

So that's it! I hope to see your name among the HUGE amount of entries at Card Cupids this week!

New set up!

2011-03-02T11:47:00.000-08:00

Last weekend my 6 year old computer, that I got up at 3am to buy on Black Friday 2004, finally decided to die. Well, actually the router died, but because the computer had long since rejected it's own disk drive, I couldn't install another. So, I finally got a new computer!
It's quite the difference from the old one. For one, the monitor isn't the size of my desk, and doesn't weigh 450 lbs. yay! For two, it's super fast and just plain gorgeous.
Why I am sharing this with you? Because hopefully, having a new faster machine for me will mean more posts for you to read!

Also, I think it's time for a new desk. When I was a teenager I was obsessed with antiques and all things "Shabby Chic", and I found this desk and an antique mall for $40 and scooped it up. Over the last ten years it's been moved 6 or 7 times and the paint has been picked off... even as I was waiting for the picture to load I was absent minded chipping away at the paint with my nail, oops. And it's one of only two "antique" things in my house. Now I like my stuff new and shiny. oh well, it works for now.

Hope you are having a great week!

Buttons and Ribbon: New Card Cupids Challenge!

2011-02-24T08:37:00.000-08:00

This week at Card Cupids our challenge is "Buttons and Ribbon". I made this simple card:
using a digi stamp from our sponsor (and one of my most favorite Digi companies!) Bugaboo. And the winner of this weeks challenge will get SEVEN free digis from Bugaboo! If you've ever browsed their store, you know this is an awesome prize :)

It's a super easy and fun challenge, so I hope you enter!

Zebra Cake aka the cutest cake I've ever made!

2011-02-19T15:14:00.000-08:00

Yesterday my best friend turned 26, and today we're having her big birthday bash! She asked me to make the cake (I'd already been planning to do so!) and mentioned she liked purple fondant. This was the first thing that popped into my head:

I LOVE how it turned out. I'm seriously proud of this cake and I hope she loves it!

Inside is black magic cake with chocolate ganache filling and this buttercream, which is my new favorite buttercream recipe!

I know that pedestal looks bad, but the cake wont be served on that :) It was just for decorating purposes!

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner!

2011-02-19T15:10:00.000-08:00

The winner from my giveaway was number 16: Samantha! Thank you all so much for entering and Samantha, you have an email ;)

psst!

2011-02-18T16:36:00.000-08:00

You still have a few hours to enter my little giveaway at the bottom of this post. I'll post a winner tomorrow morning!

Card Cupids Challenge: Red, White and Blue

2011-02-17T09:41:00.000-08:00

I had a hard time with this weeks challenge at Card Cupids, and I'm not gonna lie: I don't love my card. When I hear Red white and Blue I think:

And it's really not the season for flag cards, and I think making one would have been a cop-out. But I DO love my little bear digi stamp from Bugaboo and my Cherry printed paper from DCVW and my "Little Sunshine" stamp from Pink By Design...so I think I will try to make another version of this card in the future.

What did YOU come up with?

Card Cupid Blog Appreciation Tour

2011-02-12T05:00:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the Card Cupids Appreciation Blog Tour!

Be sure to start at the beginning at Card Cupids, so you don't miss a thing! If you're coming from Christy's blog, then you are in the right place.

Our Blog Tour theme today is Valentine’s projects for children! I'm going to show you how I made Chocolate Dipped marshmallows on a stick.

To make chocolate dipped marshmallows, you will need:
Marshmallows (these are strawberry ones, om nom nom!)
Lollipop sticks
chocolate (I used semi sweet chips)
Sprinkles (optional)
Hideous Green Counter tops (also optional, but it would make me feel better if you had them too)

I made a stand using a block of Styrofoam, red ribbon and paper to hold up my sticks.

First, dip the tip of the sticks in melted chocolate, and then put the stick in the marshmallow. Let these cool.

Then, holding the stick, dip the marshmallow halfway into the chocolate and top with sprinkles. Let cool.
Put the marshmallows in a tiny bag and tie with Ribbon.

And display however you want! So easy and cute! Your kids can help with almost every single step of these adorable treats and they will LOVE to make them! (I know I did!) It would also be really easy to cut tags and add them to the ribbon so everyone knows who they're from.

The secret word from my stop is SMILES. Remember, to win the Blog Tour prize you have to email the secret sentences to info@cardcupids.org by 11:59 pm February 14 with subject: Blog Tour Prize.

Card Cupids is collecting handmade cards, new stuffed animals, coloring/activity books, crayons and markers for Absolutely Incredible Kids Day on March 15 as well as cards for Kate and Christopher and their siblings. If you would like to donate handmade cards or care package items, please visit Card Cupids for more information.

Your next stop on the blog tour is Heather. Have fun!

Card Cupids mission is to provide encouragement and joy by sending Card Cuddle Care Packages to children who are facing difficult challenges in their young lives regardless of their economic background. Card Cupids believes that every child needs to know that they are loved. A stuffed animal to hold, along with cards that share a positive message can help lift the spirits of children that are faced with difficult challenges. Card Cupids collects handmade cards to be sent to children along with new stuffed animals, coloring books, activity books, crayons and markers. Card Cupids hopes to provide numerous Card Cuddle Care Packages to children in hospitals, foster care, homeless shelters as well as children facing difficulties.
Now, if you've read this far, here's a treat for you! Follow my blog and leave a comment on this post by 8am PST on 2.19 to enter to win a $10 gift card to either Michael's or JoAnn's (winner will chose!) be sure to leave me an email address where I can reach you!
I will draw a winner using Random.org on Sunday, February 20th!

Happy Valentines Day!

New Design Reveal!

2011-02-10T10:25:00.000-08:00

Happy Thursday everyone! If you're reading this in a reader, I invite you to hop over and see my SUPER cute new blog!

Do you love it? Because I do!

Thanks again to Brittany at Brittany Garner design for this adorable header, I think it's perfect for Pumpkin Butts :)

Want one of your own? You can find Brittany's Etsy shop here.

psst: Be sure to come back Saturday for the Card Cupids Blog Tour! I'll be having a giveaway!

New challenge and news!

2011-02-09T09:31:00.000-08:00

This week's challenge at Card Cupids is to create a boy themed card. We needed to use a digi stamp from Fresh brewed Designs and I chose "Squeakers Ride".
Most of my cards end up girly. I can't help it! I always use glitter or pearls or some sort of non-masculine embellishment. So I kept it simple using mustard and brown paper (both from Stampin' Up) and a scrap of red patterned paper. I thought it sort of looked like Squeakers was going to a picnic, with his cheese strapped to the roof, so I love the picnic blanket looking paper.

On to the News:
This weekend Card Cupids is having a Blog Tour! It starts Feb. 12th at 8am. It's going to be HUGE with nearly 20 stops and prizes and tons of Valentines day projects. Hope to see you there! You'll want to stop at Card Cupids first so you can get the correct order, because there's going to be a secret word at each stop you'll need to collect to be entered in the grand prize giveaway.

And in Pumpkinbutts news: Pumpkinbutts is getting a mini makeover! My talented friend Brittany is working on a custom blog header for me and I'm so excited! Brittany has an Etsy store here, where you can find adorable digital art, custom monograms and labels, wedding invitations, and all sorts of fun stuff. Super excited for our mini makeover! Hopefully I'll have it up in a few weeks.

Card Cupid 3D Challenge!

2011-02-02T08:20:00.000-08:00

The challenge this week over at Card Cupids is 3D or pop up cards, sponsored by Bugaboo Stamps. I have to admit, it was stinking hard to pick my stamp for this challenge because their stamps ARE SO CUTE! I want them all!
But, I chose this little boy with the giant adorable cupcake, and I love him :)

I made a stair step fold card. The dimensions are 10.5X5.5 and it's folded at 1 1/4, 2 1/2, 4 1/4, 6 and 8 1/4. You can find a great tutorial of how to make this card on Split Coast Stampers. Just be sure that if you are not using a scor-pal, you follow the second set of directions on where to score! I messed up the first time.
patterned papers are from my scrap stash
cupcake is from Sweet Treats, cut at 3 inches (made from all scraps)
stamp is from Michael's $1 bin
ink is Distress Ink in Black Soot
Boy is colored with Crayola markers and accented with a Spica Pen!

The winner of this challenge will get to pick SEVEN free Bugaboo images! That's an awesome prize!

Down time

2011-01-31T07:20:00.000-08:00

I haven't been in my craft room in nearly two weeks! I've been reading and relaxing and spending lots of time with my husband, which has been pretty awesome. We joined a gym and I'm hoping to get more physically active in the next few months, so that's exciting (for me).
I promise to get in my craft room tonight after the gym and I'll have some crafty fun to show to you very soon :)
Have a great week!

Exciting News!

2011-01-25T21:25:00.000-08:00

Now that the announcement has been posted, I can share that I've been selected, along with a ton of other talented ladies, to be a guest designer over at pinkcricut.com!

I'm a huge fan of Sarah's, and of her design team (Erin Lee Creative is one of the first cricut blogs I ever followed!) so I can't tell you how excited I am to work with them. I'm not sure yet when my day to be featured is, but I will let you, faithful two readers, know when it is!

Want to see the card that landed me the spot? :)It really is one of my favorite cards I've ever made. When I cut that tiny cupcake out and put it together, I may have actually squealed from delight. It's SO cute!

Recipe:

Bird from Create A Critter, 3 inches
Cupcake-Sweet Treats, 1 inch
heart and scalloped heart-welded and cut from gypsy
Face Stamp-Peachy Keen Medium Critter Faces
White gel pen
Diamond Glaze (makes the eyes glossy)
Patterned Paper- We R Memory Keepers Holly Jolly collection
heart brads-LSS
"Eat Cake" stamp-Studio G
Black ink- Tim Holtz distress ink in black soot
Red ink- Studio G
Pink Ink (around the edges of scalloped heart)-Stampin up Pink Passion
Ribbon-4 for $1 bin at Michael's
Blush-People Blush! I wanted him to have pink cheeks, but I don't own chalks..and since I'm on a spending freeze I had to make do. My own blush on a Qtip was the perfect touch and free to boot ;)

I hope you like my card and I cannot WAIT to see what this group comes up with in the next few weeks!

I'm also entering this card in the Getting Cricky with K Andrew Challenge to use a bird in a card!

Card Cupids Challenge!

2011-01-20T09:25:00.000-08:00

This weeks challenge over at Card Cupids is Cards with more than one fold.
I made a Z-fold card and used the digi stamp from Sweet and Sassy Stamps called "Cocoa's Latte". Isn't it adorable?! The winner of the challenge will get three free Digis!

You have until Sunday to enter, and I hope you do!

I'm in love with a mini

2011-01-17T16:45:00.001-08:00

album! I made my first mini album this past week, and I had so much fun that I've already made a second one. I love doing these!

Much like my regular scrapbooks, my minis are super simple and leave lots of room for pictures. The precious baby mini has almost no embellishments, because I don't really have any unisex ones (I'm not sure who that one is for yet). I may add some things later to make it more boy themed for my new nephew or my new GREAT nephew!

The Evalyn album is for some friends who are due to have their first baby later this month. I thought that it would be a sweet thing for them to fill with pictures and mail to an out of town family member or something :)
The little plaque on the front cover is to write in Evalyn's birthdate. The inside cover has a tag that pulls out of a pocket, and that can be written on or a photo attached to it. Each of the pages has a simple little embellishment, but mostly I just left lots of room for pictures and writing about how adorable Evie is!

So those are my very first minis. I'm already stalking ebay to purchase more chipboard books to cover and create more minis for all of the preggos in my life.

Love Layout

2011-01-13T09:04:00.000-08:00

I made this layout this past weekend for a few of our engagement pictures (which I finally printed out through Snapfish-4 years later!)
This is the first layout that I've completed in 8 years! Obviously, I'm pretty proud of myself :)

The background paper and red paper are from a set that a coworker gave me for Christmas
The "LOVE" was cut from Elegant cakes and welded with the Gypsy and inked with Making Memories Sepia ink, and studio G red ink
The design on the corner is cut from Elegant Cakes, and also inked
The paper flowers are from Hero Arts
The brads are from a LSS
The flat back pearls are from my stash

When I originally designed the layout I was going to cut backgrounds for the photos from the Gypsy Wanderings cartridge, but when I got them on there it just felt too busy. My style for scrapbooking has always been pretty plain and basic, though, so I think this fits right in with the rest of my incomplete scrapbook!

I just ordered 100 more photos from snapfish, so I'm hoping to really get going on my scrapbook! I forgot how much fun it was.

Card Cupids Challenge!

2011-01-11T09:28:00.000-08:00

This weeks challenge over at Card Cupids is almost as easy as last weeks was! All that is required is that you use your favorite embellishment. Mine is glitter glue, and it's probably hard to tell from my photo, but the entire spaceship is glittered all to death. I just love glitter glue! (as a bonus, I'm allowed to send it to the hospital because the glitter can't fall off of the card.)

The stamp is from Fresh Brewed Designs, who is generously sponsoring our challenge this week with three free digi images to the winner!

Again, I made this card Valentines day colors so that I can use it in my big batch of Valentines Cards for the two hospitals Card Cupids is sponsoring. Don't forget that Card Cupids has a big prize for the Valentine's Day Challenge and you have until Feb. 4th to submit your cards. The Prize includes Pearl Pens, a My Pink Stamper DVD and more and is worth over $100!

I've posted a few Vday cards in my last post if you're in need of a little inspiration and I look forward to seeing what you come up with!

Some Valentines Cards

2011-01-10T16:15:00.001-08:00

I'm almost halfway to my goal of 25 Valentines cards for Card Cupids, so I thought I would share a few that I've made in the last couple of days.
The cupcake shaped card is my favorite yet, I just love it! Hopefully these inspire you to create some Valentines cards of your own!

Maybe if I say it outloud...

2011-01-09T15:07:00.000-08:00

I'll actually stick with it. I'm going on a shopping fast! I'm not sure for how long, maybe April because if I'm going to do this, I need to make it worth it. I've just been shopping at craft stores WAY too much! Since Monday alone I've been to Michaels three times, Joann's once, a local scrapbook store that was going out of business (and had huge discounts!) and shopped online. All of this:plus more that I can't remember (and that's when you know you have a problem, when you buy so much stuff in a week that you don't remember what it all was!) has joined my stash just this week. I need to start focusing on using up what I have and stop buying stuff that I don't need!
So that's my story. Wish me luck!

Anything Goes Challenge

2011-01-04T08:10:00.000-08:00

This week over at Card Cupids we're having an "Anything Goes" challenge, sponsored by Whimsy Stamps!
I chose this adorable dog holding a sign and made a 4X4 card (my first!). Of course I had to make this a brown dog because he's goofy looking and reminds me of Bill, my Chocolate Lab. Plus, he's chomping on that sign, which is totally something Bill would do! :)

If you've never joined us at Card Cupids for a Challenge, this is the one to join! It's super easy and the winner gets a $15 gift certificate to Whimsy Stamps!

Recipe:
Red Cardstock-Stampin' Up Really Red
Pattern Cardstock-DCVW stack
Red and clear Glitter Glue-Studio G (dollar spot at Michael's)
Ribbon-Target dollar spot
Rub on-Stampin' Up
Markers-Crayola Super Tips :)

oh, and I've decided to make all my challenge cards this month Valentine themed, so I can reach my goal of 25 Valentine cards to send to Card Cupids by February 4th!

My Pink Stamper Challenge/Design Team Submission

2011-01-02T13:40:00.000-08:00

Yesterday Robyn over at Mypinkstamper.com announced that she had two spots left on her design team, and issued a challenge to use her favorite colors, Green Pink and Brown and a favorite cartridge of your choice. I was so excited to see that because Robyn is the one that got me into Cricut machines, and I would love to work with her. Of course, the more I see entries popping up in my google reader from blogs I admire and subscribe to, the more nervous I get, but I had to try! :)

This card will serve two purposes, as I will be sending it to Card Cupids as part of my valentines package (which is appropriate as My Pink Stamper is one of the Card Cupid sponsors for the Valentines challenge!). It's my goal to make 25 cards for Valentines day for Card Cupids!

Recipe:
Tree and Hearts-Simply Charmed (my favorite Cartridge!)
Green and light pink cardstock-Recollections
Dark Pink and brown textured cardstock-Stampin' Up
Ribbon-Michaels 4/$1 bin
Stamp- Hampton Art Joyous Holidays
Ink-Stampin' Up Passion Rose
Glitter Glue-Studio G
Marvey Gel Excel Gel Pen
Crayola Super tips (light pink dots and stitching)

Also, this was the first thing I've cut with my Gypsy and I love it! I hid the contour in the tree, sized the hearts, laid them out on the mat, then went into my craft room, stuck the paper to mat and cut it. Crafting doesn't get easier than that!

Merry Christmas to me!

2010-12-30T14:13:00.000-08:00

This is what my sweet husband got me for Christmas! I finally got it today and I can't wait to play with it!
So many exclamations marks in one short post!!!

This is one of the craft things I kept telling myself I didn't need...just like the Cricut and the Martha Stewart Scoreboard...and then I get anyways. Hopefully I'll end up loving it as much as I do my other "do not need" items on my desk!

Bake Sale!

2010-12-29T11:54:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in my last post that I organized a Bake Sale earlier this month at my work to help raise money for our Christmas family (and we raised quite a bit!! YAY!). I wanted to share the bake sale signs that I made using my Cricut because, well, I'm pretty sure they were the cutest Bake Sale signs EVER. By the time I finished them it was something like 11:30pm, so my picture is a little dark, sorry!

The font is from the Elegant Cakes cartridge (and it's not even the prettiest font on there!), the cup of cocoa is from the Holiday Cakes cartridge and the happy cupcake is from Simply Charmed.
And here are the goodies I made and packaged up. I'd never made either Rice Krispie Treats or Peanut Butter Blossoms before, but both turned out really well and sold quickly.

Peppermint Nutella blossoms

2010-12-22T20:48:00.000-08:00

A while back I asked my imaginary friends on a message board what to make for a bake sale, and Sarah said I needed to make peanut butter blossoms. I used her recipe and whipped up a batch. They seemed to be a pretty big hit and I've made them three times since then (and the bakesale was only a few weeks ago!)
Well, I bought a two pack of nutella at Costco a few weeks ago, and with DH trying to lose 10 lbs, it was not a good combo. One of them had to go. So I decided to try to substitute Nutella in the Peanut butter blossom recipe. Nutella is softer than pb, so I added at 1/8 cup of cocoa powder for good measure, and omitted the vanilla.
They spread out a lot more than traditional pb blossoms, but with a candy cane kiss on top and their chocolately goodness: omg om nom nom. I'm sure I'm not the first person to think of this, so I'll check the interwebs and see if I can find a recipe that holds it's traditional blossom shape a little better before I make these again.

Nutella Blossoms

2 cups Bisquick
3.4 cup Nutella
1.8 cup cocoa powder
1 can sweetened condensed milk
white sugar
kisses of your choice

mix ingredients, roll into balls and roll balls in white sugar. Bake for 10 minutes at 350. Remove from oven, let sit for 1 minute, then press unwrapped kisses into top of cookies. Remove from cookie sheet and cool.
Makes 4 dozen

Tomorrow these will be off to a friend who asked me to make her Christmas cookies. How could I say no? :)

11th hour Christmas Cards

2010-12-21T19:24:00.000-08:00

I didn't think I had Christmas Cards in me this year, but at the last second (meaning this morning before I left for work and tonight when I got home) I pumped out these:

yeah, so I've only made 6. And so they're going to be reciprocal cards (I'm sending them to people who've already sent us cards!) and so, they may not be there by Christmas. BUT I made them, and they're done and they'll be in the mail tomorrow!
This is one of my favorite designs from when I was making cards earlier this year, most of which I sent to Card Cupids, so I decided to re-create it. The lovely wreath is cut from the Holiday Cakes cartridge, and to save time I skipped cutting the berries and used glitter glue instead.

And, it's only 7:40 right now, so I have a few hours to make more. So I may even get to making reciprocal cards from last year, when I didn't send out cards at all.

I feel so alive! (not really.)

Hobby Hopping Contest

2010-12-20T22:07:00.000-08:00

My friend Christy over at Hobby Hopping is having a pretty awesome blog contest! If she gets to 50 followers by Christmas, she'll draw a name and give the winner their choice of 5 Copics, 10 Spicas, a Glitter Ritz/Peel Off starter kit, a set of hand-made cards, or a big box of candy.
Any of those would be amazing to win! She's only 14 followers away, so, go, follow and if you haven't seen her blog yet, you're in for a treat!

Christmas Boxes

2010-12-19T21:04:00.000-08:00

With only a few days left until Christmas, I think it's safe to say I've given up on making my Christmas cards this year. I just don't have the time.
BUT I did make these adorable boxes to fill with homemade candy for my coworkers! I used this box tutorial, and cut the reindeer from Create a Critter. I used the fill page feature to cut as many from a page as I could at 5 inches, and I had 10 boxes done in no time (less than an hour). I used my paper cutter to score the boxes, which worked okay, but I bought a Martha Stewart Scoreboard a few days later. If I ever make these boxes again, the scoreboard will make it a much faster process!

I made them while the peanut butter button cookies were baking and cooling and it worked out really well. I forgot to take a picture after I added the gift tags, but I cut small tags with the Plantin Schoolbook cartridge and tucked them near the Reindeer's head with a sentiment and the recipients name. They really turned out cute.I added peppermint bark to these after the picture too! I almost forgot to put it in there.

So, if I don't post again before Saturday, have a Merry Christmas!

Use Your Stash: Card Cupids Challenge #2

2010-12-09T08:07:00.000-08:00

This weeks Card Cupid challenge is so super easy, it's a use your stash challenge! The only requirement is that you can't buy anything new for this card.
We're sponsored by Heather Ellis Co. this week, so we each chose one of her adorable digi stamps to use. I chose this girl in the bathtub stamp, and then remembered that I had bubble print paper in my stash. From 8th grade. Yeah, this stuff is OLD.

The pink stickers are also really old, I've had them for about 7 or 8 years. The pink and the blue card stock and the corner rounder have been in my stash since this summer. I was a little mad at myself for forgetting to round the bubble paper before sticking it down with my very unforgiving ATG gun, but it doesn't look that bad.

What did you come up with? You have until Sunday to enter and win three Heather Ellis digis!

Christmas Cards

2010-12-07T20:22:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago, before I joined the Card Cupids design team, I made a generic back ground to use for all of my Christmas cards. Then, after I joined Card Cupids I learned that we would be sending Christmas Cards to 200 kids at the Children's Hospital at Legacy Emmanuel. Now, I work full time and have an additional part time job, so I thought about it for about a second, then decided to use my backgrounds for Card Cupids cards instead. My family wont notice if they don't receive another piece of mail, but that piece of mail could make some kids day. Easiest decision ever!

So, here is the batch of cards I sent off to Card Cupids last week. I love them all! I know I should be mass producing them, but I can't help but make each one different. It's a sickness.

The Rub-ons are by American Crafts, and I found them at Ross (package of 10 for $3!!)

New Card Cupid Recipients

2010-12-06T08:20:00.000-08:00

Happy Monday Morning! Actually, i despise Monday mornings. I'm like this guy:

But, regardless of my feelings of this day, we have some new children needing some cheering up over at Card Cupids, please go over and read their stories, and consider sending in a card to cheer them up! These three stories really tugged at my heart strings. I can't wait to make them something special.

Card Cupids Challenge 1

2010-12-03T08:02:00.000-08:00

We're running a fun sketch challenge through December 5th over at Card Cupids! Here is the sketch, from Becky Fleck at Page Maps:

And my interpretation using "Tiny Bow Tia" digi stamp from Some Odd Girl Stamps.

The winner of the challenge will receive a gift certificate for three digi stamps from Some Odd Girl, so be sure to play along!

We'll be running a new challenge every Sunday with fun sponsors and great prizes, so be sure to check back for more!

Thanksgiving

2010-11-29T17:15:00.000-08:00

Looking for the Card Cupids Blog Hop?! Go HERE.
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This has been an amazing year, and I have a lot to be Thankful for! We hosted Thanksgiving at our house this year, and it was a ton of fun. I spent two days in the kitchen baking pies, a cheesecake (crossing one more thing off of my 25 before 25 list) , the biggest Turkey my kitchen has ever seen (24 lbs!) and tons of potatoes.

I wanted to share this recipe for Cranberry sauce with you, because my lands it was Delicious! It's from Epicurious and has 1/3 cup vodka in it, if that helps interest you ;)

I predict it will make a re-appearance at Christmas dinner too.

Cosmopolitan Cranberry Sauce

1 (12-ounce) bag fresh cranberries, rinsed, drained, and picked through
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup vodka
3 tablespoons orange-flavored liqueur, such as Grand Marnier or Triple Sec (I omitted the liqueur and used mandarin juice-we have a mandarin tree)

In heavy medium saucepan over moderate heat, combine cranberries, sugar, and 1/2 cup water. Bring to boil, stirring often to dissolve sugar, then reduce heat to moderately low and simmer, stirring often, until thickened and reduced to about 3 cups, about 15 minutes.

Transfer to medium bowl and cool, stirring often, until tepid, about 30 minutes. Stir in vodka and liqueur. Transfer to serving bowl, cover, and refrigerate until chilled and set, at least 2 hours. (Sauce can be made up to 2 weeks ahead and refrigerated.) Serve chilled or at room temperature.

Card Cupid Christmas Blog Hop!

2010-11-26T05:00:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the first ever Card Cupids Blog Hop! I'm so excited to be a part of this, and to have you join me. You should have arrived from Janel's Blog, if so, you're on the right path! If you are reading my blog in a reader or are just stopping by, be sure to start at www.cardcupids.org so you don't miss out on any of the fun (and prizes!)

Card Cupids is a brand new organization with the mission to provide encouragement and joy by sending Card Cuddle Care Packages to children who are facing difficult challenges in their young lives regardless of their economic background. Each package contains cards lovingly handmade by our Design Team and anyone else that wants to participate, as well as a stuffed animal donated by Card Cupids. It's so easy to make cards and I feel like I'm giving back by sharing them with children and putting a smile on their faces!

We're currently collecting Christmas cards to send to the children's Hospital at Legacy Emanuel in Portland, Oregon. Here is a Christmas card I made to send in:

The best part? The hat jiggles! I love it. If you would like to see how I made the card (and the jiggle in action!) I made this short video for you.

And now for the part you've been waiting for: The CANDY! Each of the Design Team members is donating a piece to the grand prize. I chose to donate this iRock.
I've never used one, but I really want one and thought you might too!

Here's how you can enter to win:

1. Comment on every blog in the hop.
2. Follow CardCupids.
3. for a second entry, mention the hop on your blog and leave a separate comment with a link on the card cupids site.

Winner will be announced on Card Cupids on Wednesday.

So now you're ready to move on to the next blog in the hop, my friend Heather! Have fun!

In case you got lost, here is the blog hop order:

Card Cupids
Stephanie
Christy
Jade
Luisa
Janel
Angela <-- YOU ARE HERE! Heather
Janet
Radwa
Card Cupids again!

Thanks so much for joining us, and good luck with the prize!

Cricut Cartridge Deal PSA

2010-11-22T11:28:00.000-08:00

Michaels has the Cricut Cake and all that comes with it on major clearance, so last night I got these three cartridges

for $9.99 each! They can be used with any Cricut machine and each cartridge comes with a font and tons of images. I'm beyond excited to use them and that they were so cheap! Go get you some, quick!

My Cricut cartridge collection is growing :)

This time next week

2010-11-19T10:12:00.000-08:00

I will be part of the first ever Card Cupids blog hop! (also, my first blog hop of any sort). There's going to be a big prize to enter for that the entire design team is contributing to, so be sure to come back and hop along for a chance to win! It will be a fun time and we'll all be sharing a Christmas card creation.

Here's a sneak peek at what I've contributed to the big grand prize:See you next Friday!

Adventures in Quilling

2010-11-16T20:30:00.000-08:00

After having this tutorial by Reese Dixon bookmarked for a year, I finally decided to take the plunge and attempt quilling. I'm in a ornament exchange, and that snowflake is just the thing I was looking for to wow my recipient.
Unfortunately, none of the (two) craft stores in my area had quilling tools. So, I took a large sewing needle and clipped off the ends with a wire cutter. You'll see in my snowflake that it didn't work all that well and the ends of my spirals are wrinkled...but that being said, I LOVE my snowflake! I plan to spray adhesive on it and glitter it up like Reese did.
I plan to make many many more of these. It really didn't take me very long (after the initial cutting of the paper strips) and it was surprisingly fun. And you really can't beat the wow factor of quilling.
And you'll be pleased to know I ordered some quilling tools from amazon.com, and they should be here by this weekend, so my exchange recipient will be getting some unwrinkled snowflakes :)

Card for Nina

2010-11-11T19:08:00.000-08:00

Nina is an 10 year old foster child with a birthday coming up. I made this happy little pig card to send to her.

I'll be mailing off Nina's card tomorrow, along with these, all for the Children's Hospital at Legacy Emanuel in Portland Oregon.
Want to be a Card Cupid too? Send your handmade cards to

Card Cupids
C/O Stephanie

13203 Overcup Oak Court, Apt 201

Herndon, VA 20171

We're have an ongoing deal with the Legacy Emanuel Children's hospital, and they need cards for any event, so if you have more than you know what to do with, please consider clearing out your stash and making a child's day!

Adding to my stash

2010-11-09T21:34:00.000-08:00

I was so excited to pick up my package of cuttlebug folders from the post office yesterday, but unfortunately it was a crazy day at work and I didn't get to play with them. Today after work, they were the first thing I reached for!

I plan to send in a stack of plain Christmas cards to Card Cupids for the hospital, so I made this little card using the snowflake cuttlebug folder, my texture boutique, sandpaper, glitter glue, and paper embellishments.
The little trees came in a jar of paper embellishments that my mom bought me to use for the Card Cupid project :) Thanks Mama, I'm sure I'll find lots of uses for them!

Card Cupids announcement

2010-11-08T12:05:00.000-08:00

I'm so very proud to announce that I'm now a member of the Card Cupids Design Team! Card Cupids is a brand new organization that sends bundles of cards to needy children who can use some cheering up, how sweet is that?!

Please be sure to go over to the Card Cupids blog and check out the other talented ladies that make up our design team, and I hope you'll play along with our challenges and participate in any way you can!

Salted Caramel Hot Chocolate Cupcakes

2010-11-04T18:45:00.001-07:00

Have you tried the Salted Caramel Hot Chocolates at Starbucks yet? If not, you should probably go get one right now. I'll wait.
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If you're like me, you're now addicted to these tasty treats. I don't know why they're SO stinking good!!
Last weekend we were having friends over for a horror movie marathon, and I knew I wanted to make salted caramel something. I settled on mini cupcakes after finding the beautiful TasteSpotting and sorting the recipes by the "salted caramel" tag.
I made the salted caramel buttercream from this recipe, and I highly recommend! For one, it was really, really easy. For two, it was so good!
For the cupcakes, I cheated. I used a box milk chocolate cake mix, and substituted strong brewed coffee for the water. They don't taste like coffee, but for some reason I felt that it would be more of a hot chocolate tasting cupcake, and I was happy with the result.

Cards for Christina and Riley

2010-11-02T21:58:00.000-07:00

These are two more cards for Card Cupids, for 3 year old Christina and 10 year old Riley.

If you look closely, you'll see that the Dog's tag even has a teeny little "R" on it :)

I hope these bring a smile to their faces! I'll be dropping my three cards in the mail, but if you're interested in submitting a card you have until November 10 for Ashlie and Christina and November 17 for Riley.

one card, three purposes

2010-11-02T21:35:00.000-07:00

First and foremost, this card is for Ashlie. If you haven't heard of Card Cupids yet, you should check out their blog. It's a very sweet project designed to brighten sick childrens' hospital stays, and I think it's just wonderful. Normally I'd use some glitter glue on a card like this, but since I'm not sure if it would be allowed, I left it off this time.

Second, I'm entering this card in Momo's Tuesday challenge! This week's challenge was to use some sort of embossing, so I used my Sizzix texture boutique and the Sizzix tropical paisley embossing folder to add texture to my purple square.

Third, and finally, I'm entering this card into the MAG challenge! This week's challenge was to use page 45 of the Create a Critter Cartridge, and page 45 only. I was excited to see this challenge as Create a Critter is one of only 3 cartridges I own, so I could actually participate this week! YAY!

While Ashlie was the inspiration to make a card, the two challenges made me use cuts and techniques I may not have. This was a really fun way to create a card, and I really hope it does make Ashlie smile ;)

Two things

2010-10-29T08:16:00.000-07:00

1. I just discovered the most beautiful...blog? community? I'm not sure what it is, but I am in love. It's called Taste Spotting. It's very visually beautiful, but the recipes, oh the recipes! I haven't tried any yet, but you better believe I'm starting a list. And it will be long.

2. I have to laugh at the kind of google hits that my blog gets around Halloween. The combination of "pumpkin" and "butts" makes me pop up on some funny searches. A few from the last couple of days:
Fat Pumpkin Butts
Pumpkin Carvings of Butts
Pumpkins shaped like Butts
Pumpkins with Butts
Pictures of pumpkin butts
pumpkin pie with butt

Maybe I'm the only one that finds that funny, and I'm sure that this post will result in more weird search results, but that's part of the fun in having a blog hit tracker :)

Happy Friday!

Thanksgiving Card

2010-10-28T19:06:00.000-07:00

I made this simple little card for the Cricut Cardz Challenge, #48 which is to make a card for Thanksgiving. I have very few sentiment stamps, so I covered up part of a stamp that said "Thanks you're sweet" so that I could just have it say Thanks. Ideally, I'd have liked it to say "Give Thanks"...but I do what I can :)

The cardbase is from Plantin Schoolbook (I don't know that it's a card "feature", but a card was one of my button options. Is that the same thing?), leaves are cut from the Create a Critter at 2 3/4 inches, the brown craft paper is from my stash, the rest is from Stampin' Up. The brads are from JoAnns.

I embossed the orange leaf with my new toy:

Sizzix Texture Boutique! I love it! I only have two folders right now (8 more are in the mail!). It's not funny how quickly I'm outgrowing my craft space. There are just so many fun things out there right now.

The winniest weekend ever!

2010-10-25T17:16:00.000-07:00

Winniest is not a word, but I think it needs to be! Last week, I entered into several blog hop contests and contests to win Pink ATG guns, and, much to my surprise I won THREE of the contests (not three ATG's :)! I haven't won anything since April, so to win three in a week was a thrill to say the least :)

The first contest was held by Scotch ATG, and I won this pink ATG gun. I've been using it for a few days, and I can't say enough good things about it. I adore it. It seems like it would be bulky, but it's really not once you get the hang of it. And you don't have to press down to release the adhesive at all (which you have to with tombo mono rollers-and it often left lines in my paper). Love.

The second contest was by Helen, over at craftingcricutmom <--click for her blog! The contest was also to win a Pink ATG, but then she decided to draw a name for a bonus gift, and that was me! I received her package today and this is what it contained: Thank you so much, Helen! Everything is so fun, and I couldn't wait to use the Christmas stamps, so today I made my first Christmas card:

I love that my stash is getting to the point where I have everything I need to make my ideas come to life, it's so fun.

The third contest was over at Scrapping Sweets By Abby <-- click for her blog! The contest was to win a Brown and pink Cricut apron, and I won! We also learned that we only live 40 minutes from each other, and Abby had taken a trip to my middle of nowhere town just a few days before the contest. What are the chances?! I'll add a picture of my apron as soon as it arrives.

so that concludes my winnigest week ever! I hope you all get a chance to check out Helen and Abby's blogs, they are both really creative ladies full of good ideas. Have a great week! (I hope it's winny too.)

Something other than a card

2010-10-20T20:01:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to think of ways to use my cricut to make something other than cards. (I'm addicted to card making right now, though!)
Since Halloween is coming, I've been focusing on that. I decided I wanted to make some luminaries to line my sidewalk up to my door step for Halloween night (assuming it doesn't rain!). These are what I came up with:And the best part? They won me an ATG gun! I'll have to tell you about that in a another post, though, because this has been the winniest week ever for me and I can't wait to share my prizes.

I also have these mirrors from Ikea in my entryway, and I cut a bunch of shapes from Pumpkin Carvings at 3" to go in each mirror. I love them! I think I'll be changing out the cuts for each holiday this season, because I love the effect. It's very hard to take a picture of a mirror, so you'll have to trust me that it looks much cuter in real life.

And then I used the leftover face cuts from my mirror cutouts to decorate my mini pumpkins for Halloween. I always keep my mini pumpkins up through Thanksgiving, so I didn't want to permanently alter them, and I think this works perfectly.

So, that's what I've been up to!

ETA: sorry for the horrid pictures! It's dark by the time I get home, so with that comes terrible pictures until Spring :)

3 year old birthday card

2010-10-11T21:55:00.000-07:00

I made this sweet little card for my nephew PJ, who will be three next month. Where the heck does time go?! It seems like just yesterday I was hogging all his baby cuddles and listening to him grunt and try to figure out the world.

Everything except for the 3 is from Create a critter, the 3 is from Plantin Schoolbook. Since there was so much going on with the train I had a hard time coming up with a background, so I settled for plain blue stripes. The bear and the 3 are pop-dotted from the page.

Since PJ is only 3, I guess this card is more for his mama (my sister), who also just got her first cricut a few days before I did! They live 500 miles away but someday maybe we'll be able to have a crafty get together! A girl can dream.

I've discovered so many new wonderful blogs this week that I haven't taken the time to post on my own. I just love the cricut community I've stumbled upon, everyone is so creative and supportive. It's just so much fun.

Hope you all are having a wonderful week!

Create a Critter!

2010-10-03T12:18:00.001-07:00

Yesterday the mailman arrived bearing gifts:

Just in time for World Card Making Day! I'm so excited about this cartridge. To say I love it would be an understatement, I'm obsessed! It really does have a cutesy critter for every holiday and event. Love!

I made the two purple and pink cards yesterday, and the turkey today. If my Cricut mat hadn't lost all of it's sticky I'd still be holed up in my room today, but alas, I'm waiting for it to dry now (and crossing my fingers it gets sticky again!)

This is the last cartridge I'll be buying for awhile, at least until 2011. I have four now and I don't think I'll ever get to use all of the images I have!

Hope you're all having a wonderful weekend! I tried to send this post using my phone, but it failed. Pretty sure someone in my area code with a phone number that spells out "BLOGGER" is going to be very annoyed with me :)

Two Tier Cake

2010-10-01T11:29:00.000-07:00

This is the first thing I get to cross off of my 25 before 25 list! and, I can safely say that I am not good at this, and have no desire to attempt it again, and this is good to know!

The top smaller cake is lemon cake, using this recipe. (just the cake, not the ganache) I put a layer of plain chocolate ganache in the middle and on the top of the cake and frosted it with my favorite chocolate mousse frosting (which is a BAD idea for a cake you're going to cover with fondant! The frosting slipped out the bottom of the fondant and made it lumpy and wrinkly).

The bottom layer is my black magic cake, also with a layer of ganache in the middle and on top and with the chocolate mousse frosting. It was divine! It was moist and rich and so delicious. I was happy with that.

I also didn't flatten the top of my bottom tier, so when I stacked the smaller tier on top there was a big fat gap between the two cakes! That's why my pink "ribbon" is folded around the middle of the cake.

So my first (and most likely ONLY) two tier cake was a little lumpy and lopsided, but it was tasty and a good experience. One I will NOT be attempting again!

Chocolate Ganache (adapted from several recipes)
1 c. heavy cream
12 oz bag semi sweet chocolate chips
2 tbs unsalted butter

Bring cream and butter to a boil, remove from heat, pour in chocolate chips and let sit for 5 minutes. Stir until smooth and cool to room temperature. So easy!

Z fold Halloween Card

2010-09-29T15:18:00.000-07:00

a few nights ago I was trying to figure out how to make a z-fold card. I cut out my cardstock, folded it, and then got distracted by something shiny.
This morning I saw that the Cricut Cardz Challenge was to make a Halloween card in a Zfold shape, so there was motivation to finish my card.

I don't have any Halloween papers, but I did just buy the pumpkin carving cartridge, so I decided to use that, and green and purple for my colors. It's a little plain, but I think it's pretty cute and I love the non traditional Halloween colors!
Web and Trick or Treat are from Pumpkin Carvings Cartridge
Spider is from Potpourri Basket Cartridge
Ribbon is from Michaels 2 for $1 bin
Striped paper is from DCWV Summer Dream Stack (which is on major sale right now at JoAnn's! 180 sheets of cuteness for $7.97)
Purple glitter glue G company from JoAnns dollar spot

Bridal shower Card

2010-09-27T19:15:00.001-07:00

I made this little card for D, whose shower was Saturday. I also made the cake, but realized too late that I forgot to take a picture of it! I'm waiting on the hostess-with-the-mostest, my friend Kimberly, to send me a picture she took at the party.

Anyways, I originally made this card larger, but didn't have an envelope for it, so I whipped up this one, in a A2 size, in just a few minutes using the same design. I love the veil! It's cut from a heart printed vellum paper that I've had forever and had never found a good use for.

I learned at the shower that the bride to be hates the color pink. Oops!

My Pink Stamper Challenge

2010-09-23T19:37:00.000-07:00

Today My Pink Stamper issued a challenge: Make something with a bird in it.

Since I had no cartridge with a bird in it, I had to improvise. This little birdie is made from a pear! I cut off the leaves of the pear to make the wings, beak and feet. You can find this pear on the Potpourri basket cartridge.

What do you think, not bad, right? :)

Bird paper-Recollections "Garage Sale" line from Michaels-bird cut at 4"
Bird shadow-random cardstock cut at 4 and 1/4"
Leaves & shadow-Random cardstock cut at 2 and 3/4"
Sparkles for wings-dollar bin glitter glue from JoAnn's (Love this stuff!)
"Chirp" rub-on- miniMarks via Ross (10 packages for $3!!)

Go. Make friends!

2010-09-20T13:59:00.001-07:00

If you haven't discovered Erin Lee Creative yet, go! She's a (super cute) crafter who makes mostly cards using her Cricut and Peachy Keen and Pink Stamper stamps. I'd never heard of either of those brands before, but I follow both of their blogs now too (and watch mypinkstamper on youtube!)

And when Erin hits 400 followers (she only needs a few more) she's giving away a set of Peachy Keen stamps. So go follow, because I want some of those stamps!

Michaels Make Your Own Sale Coupon!

2010-09-16T08:38:00.000-07:00

I came across this coupon yesterday and had to share:

50% off coupon

it's a printable 50% off any regular priced item at Michaels, good through this Saturday. My Michaels is moving (yay!!), but that means that their selection is really picked over and sparse right now (Boo!).
EDIT: You can use this at JoAnn's too, if you have one.
I ended up getting some Wilton gel food colors (regularly 14.99- I paid 7.50 for 12 colors), four stamps ($1/ea. The new ones are so cute!), a versamark stamp ($7.99) and 10 very cute 12X12 scrapbook papers (5/$1!).
I think Martha Stewart knew about the sale, because her entire line was 20% off, so the coupon doesn't work for them. Too bad, because what I really wanted was this:
Martha Stewart Essential Colors Glitter Set

I just think the colors are gorgeous and would make for fun card accents. Oh well, some day, my sparkly pretties. Some day you will be mine.

Have fun with your coupon!

Tiding myself over

2010-09-15T07:00:00.000-07:00

I've officially decided to join Team Cricut. I should have my new little friend by the end of the month! Until then, I've been playing with some of the old craft stuff my HSN loving ex-boss gave me. I found this tool called a Coluzzle, it's like an X-acto knife except the blade pivots and is very tiny. It's used with a hard plastic stencil, so the blade just glides along the cuts.
I used it to make the circles on this quick card:

And here is the Coluzzle:

It's pretty cool I guess. Just not nearly as cool as a Cricut!

Mocha Cupcakes

2010-09-12T13:00:00.000-07:00

To me, there's really no better pairing than coffee and chocolate. Chocolate and peanut butter makes a close second, but chocolate and coffee is really where my heart is. A few weeks ago we had some leftover coffee after breakfast and I decided that a mocha cupcake would be the perfect use for it. Of course, I couldn't find a recipe that only wanted coffee, so I ended up going and buying instant coffee granules as well.
I found a recipe (and I can't remember where. Bad blogger! Bad! But I know it was not from any of the blogs I'm linked to because I would remember that.) and in the end, I didn't love it. It didn't give the vavavoom that I was looking for, and I think a store bought chocolate cake mix would have been better.

The frosting recipe was a keeper, though, and I'll happily share that. I decided to make these mini cupcakes since my mini cupcake pan hasn't seen any love since last Fall's pumpkin cupcakes, so I cut the recipe I found (from C&H sugar) in half, and then I altered it to make it more coffee flavored.

2 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp. instant coffee granules
1.5 tbs unsweetened cocoa powder
1/6 cup butter, melted
1/2 teas vanilla
4 tbsp. brewed coffee (room temp)

Mix together first 5 ingredients, then add the brewed coffee one tbsp at a time until you get the consistency you want. Made enough to frost 30 mini cupcakes (with some left over!)

Seasoned Breadsticks

2010-09-09T07:00:00.000-07:00

Ugly little suckers, I know, but so tasty!

If you ever see the little round container of "bread dipping spices" that has four flavors in one container, or the Johnny's Garlic Spread, buy it right away. I have used them countless times in the kitchen since getting them both a few months ago. My pizzas, bread sticks and even my toast have never been more delicious. Alas, my bread dipping spices are getting low, and I can't find them in my area *sob!*

Anyways, I made these simple and super tasty bread sticks one night when I was having a horrible carb craving.
I used my favorite pizza dough recipes, but added in 1 tbs of bread dipping spices. Then I coated them with melted butter mixed with Johnny's Garlic Spread before baking them. I've always been a bread stick fiend and these just hit the spot!

25 before 25!

2010-09-03T09:35:00.000-07:00

I got this idea from another blog who was baking 25 things while she was 25. Well, I still have 11 months to go before I'm 25, so I thought it would be neat to have 25 things to make before I'm 25. These have to be things I've never made before, so coming up with 25 was hard, so this list is a little random. Bear with me! This will get me and the hub to branch out and try things we haven't tried before, too!

1. Cheesecake-Done!
2. Cream Puffs
3. Cake with multiple tiers-Done!
4. Peanut Brittle
5. Soft Pretzels
6. Pierogis
7. Artichoke Dip
8. Buffalo Chicken Dip
9. Hummus
10. Blackberry Jam
11. Pickles
12. Quinoa
13. Mahi Mahi-done!
14. Pear tart
15. French Onion Soup
16. Mochi
17. Falafel
18. Polenta-done!
19. Italian Wedding Soup
20. Baked Potato Soup
21. Banana Cream Pie
22. Beer Braised Beef with Onions
23. Bronzed Sea Bass with Lemon Shallot Butter
24. Taffy
25. My own birthday cake

I've linked recipes to a few of these things, and I'll come back and link more as I find the recipes I want to try (if you have a suggestion please let me know!). I'll also attach my blog posts to this as I (hopefully!) cross things off my list.
Wish me luck ;)

Spinach Pie

2010-08-24T19:21:00.000-07:00

Really, I think it's more of a Calzone, but this is something my Mom made as I was growing up and she called it Spinach Pie...so it shall be named!

I start with my favorite Pizza dough recipe, but this time I add in 2tbs of Tuscan Original Bread Dipping spices. They make everything better.

Pizza dough
3 cups flour
2 and 1/4 teas. yeast (or one package)
2 tbs veggie oil
1 teas salt
1 teas sugar
1 cup warm water

After the dough rises I pile it high with fresh spinach, chunks of mozzarella (you want chunks, not shredded cheese. Trust me on this one.) sliced mushrooms, fresh garlic and a dash of salt. Then I pull one half of the pizza dough over the other half.
If it can fit, I think stuff even more spinach into the pocket that I've just created until it's packed full. Then I roll the edges over and cut a few slashes on top to let steam release.

This is one of the easiest, tastiest comfort foods for me, I love it so.

Birthday...cake!

2010-08-14T17:11:00.000-07:00

I am so so very proud of this cake! It was my first time using fondant to cover cake and I had no idea what the heck to do with the corners (so I made a weird little fold) but I loved it so. And more importantly, my mom loved it.
And I took way too many photos of it, but that's okay because I want to remember my first attempt at fondant for ever and ever :)Also, I cut tons of fondant cutters, a cake decorating book, and a gift card that I used to get my own set of tips for my birthday...so I'm going to need to find more reasons to make cake! It's too much fun.

Good things are happening

2010-08-07T12:10:00.000-07:00

in my kitchen right now! Tomorrow is my mama's birthday and I'm making her cake, lemon with homemade orange curd filling, buttercream frosting and fondant daisies. I'm really excited about it and can't wait to see how it turns out!
This was my second time making a curd (although I made lemon curd last time) and I was pleased that it was SO much easier this time! I used this recipe from Marthastewart.com and I love it. Seriously, can Martha do anything wrong? (aside from the interrupting of guests on her show, that is). I just substituted oranges for the lemons in the recipe as I thought it would contrast better with the lemon cake.

And then, Monday is my birthday. Mid twenties now. I feel....old, even though I know in the grand scheme of things, I'm still really young. oh well.

I leave you with a picture of the last cake I made for my mom's birthday in 2008 (8-8-8), so I made it in the shape of an 8...but everyone wondered why I made my mom a boob cake. I have come so far!

Adventures in Fondant (pt.2)

2010-07-25T21:20:00.000-07:00

These are fondant covered cupcakes I made awhile back. I'd posted a picture on my facebook page, so they never made it to my blog. Oops!

Not bad for my first time using fondant to cover something! I can't wait to try it on a cake next.

More baby hats!

2010-07-13T18:41:00.000-07:00

I'm surrounded by babies and preggos right now, so I've been making a ton of baby hats. (this will be my last baby post for awhile though, even I'm getting sick of them!)
I love those baby hats that end in a long tail with a knot in the end, so I drafted a pattern (this means I drew a big triangle on paper), and made these two little cuties for my friend Becca. I'm really happy with how they turned out and I'll definitely be making more for the millions of babies that are coming in the next few months :)
Also, this is how I wrapped them:

sometimes wrapping the gift is just as fun as making it!

Happy 4th of July!

2010-07-04T16:45:00.001-07:00

so this is the first holiday in a long time that I haven't baked anything themed for! It could be because it's 100 outside and the thought of turning on my oven makes me want to cry, or because I've got nowhere to go tonight. Somehow I picked up a stupid summer cold and can't go to a BBQ we were planning to go to because I don't want to get my itty bitty nephew sick.

So where ever you are, I hope YOU have a fabulous fourth with some fun themed goodies! As for me, I'm going to stay inside where it's 70 degrees and watch fashion videos on youtube :)

Simple earring holder

2010-07-01T14:18:00.000-07:00

I made this cute little earring holder last night when I realized all
my dangly earrings were getting tangled in a drawer.
I took a framed picture, covered it in mesh tulle, hot gluing it
behind the frame. Then I glued a little ribbon on it and that's it!
The only downside is that the picture won't be easy change, but since
it only took a second to glue the tulle down I won't be too sad to
redo it. Also, I love this picture of dimples and I in San Francisco,
so I don't think I'll change it anytime soon. It adds a fun little bit
of personalization to my jewelry corner.

Nursery decor

2010-06-28T18:19:00.000-07:00

another baby gift! I'm surrounded by babies right now, and I'm absolutely not complaining. Last Wednesday my beautiful nephew Nathan was born, and of course, I am in love once again. I adore my nieces and nephews.
Anyways, I made this N for his room (if you follow me on Twitter, you've seen it!) using scrapbook paper, mod podge and a wooden letter from JoAnn's Fabrics. I hadn't seen his room yet, I just asked my SIL what colors it was, and luckily my little N matches perfectly. It's the same shades and everything, I was thrilled.
So, here it is:

Love.

I also whipped up this card from stickers and die cuts that I had on hand. I love babies :)

Also, this is my 100th post! Thank you so much for reading my blog, you'll never know how much I appreciate having people (however imaginary you may be) to share my creativity with!

2010-06-28T18:09:00.001-07:00

Testing testing, guess who figured out how to blog from her iPhone? ;)

Another baby hat with ears

2010-06-25T07:00:00.000-07:00

I think I've perfected my baby hat with ears! This time I got the ears to curl in just perfectly. I love it.
It's currently in the mail to a pregnant friend far away, I hope she loves it too!

Lemon Bars

2010-06-24T17:34:00.000-07:00

I love lemon bars! I used to use a recipe that called for a lot of eggs, but me (in my weirdness) could smell the eggs after it was cooked-so I had to scrap that recipe. No one likes egg bars.

After digging out my old Everyone's First Cookbook, I found this recipe for lemon bars that also called for oatmeal and sweetened condensed milk. Sounded like a winner to me! It was. These lemon bars were so yummy that dimples and I were digging them out of the pan to eat before they were even cool. They would've been perfect with some vanilla ice cream. Mmmm. And the best part? No eggs!

Lemon Bars

3/4 c. butter, softened
1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 cup flour
1 teas baking powder
1/2 teas. salt
1 cup quick cooking oatmeal
1 (14 oz) can sweetend condensed milk
1/2 cup lemon juice

Preheat oven to 350. In mixing bowl, cream butter and sugars. Add flour, baking powder, salt and oatmeal and beat until mixture is crumbly. Spread half of the mixture into a 9X13 baking pan, pat down. In separate bowl mix milk and lemon juice and stir until thouroughly mixed. pour over crumbs in dish, then top with remaining crumbs. Bake at 350 for 25 minutes. Cool at room temp, cut into squares and chill.

Source: Everyone's First Cookbook

Blog Neglect.

2010-06-21T16:19:00.000-07:00

I know I've been neglecting my blog...and I blame my iPhone! I've had it for about a month now, and since I don't need a computer to check my social networking stuff, I'm really never on a computer anymore (especially since I'm off work until mid-July)
I do have some stuff saved up for you, though. Yummy stuff. Fun stuff. So don't give on me yet! And if I ever learn to blog from my phone, watch out now.

I do hope you all are having a wonderful SUMMER!

Camo Name

2010-06-14T15:53:00.000-07:00

My 12 year niece (I bet you can't guess her name!) is re-decorating her room, and chose camouflage for a theme. I decided to make her name in camo for her to hang on her wall or doors.

I got the letters at JoAnn's (I also bought most of them at Michael's-but they were out of R's. For TWO weeks! Stocking Fail. I'll be taking the ones that I bought back)

I traced out the shape of the letters on camo wrapping paper that I already had, then modpodged the paper on.

I tied on a girly sheer into a bow and hot glued it on to use as a hanger and that was it! Besides for the weeks of hunting for letters, the whole project only took me about an hour, and I'm happy with how it turned out.

Super Brownies

2010-06-13T12:08:00.000-07:00

Last Monday I had a craving for sweets. This is nothing new, but this time there was no ice cream or cookies to tide me over, so I pulled out Everyone's First Cook Book (that I don't think I've ever used!) and went to work.
Now, I'll admit that besides for my vegan brownies, I usually make brownies from a box. They're just so easy. But never more, friends. These are the best brownies I've ever had, and they weren't much harder than a box mix! The frosting is fudge-like in consistency and these were so rich I could only eat two before I felt like I was going to die. (usually I can clear half a pan before I get that feeling)

2/3 c. oil
2 c. Sugar
1/3 c. corn syrup
3 eggs lightly beaten
2 teas. vanilla
1/2 c. cocoa
1/2 c. flour
1/2 teas. salt
1 teas. baking powder
1 c. chopped pecans (I omitted)

Icing
1/4 c. butter, melted
2 c. powdered sugar
1/3 cup cocoa
1 teas. milk
1 teas vanilla

Preheat oven to 350. In mixing bowl, beat oil, sugar, corn syrup, eggs and vanilla. Add cocoa, flour, salt and baking powder and beat well. Stir in chopped nuts. Pour in greased/floured 9X13 pan. bake for 35 minutes. Brownies are done when toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.

In a small saucepan over low heat melt butter, add in powdered sugar, cocoa, milk and vanilla and beat until smooth. Spread over brownies.
Source: Everyone's First CookBook

Pink Floral Tee and beaded necklaces

2010-06-02T08:58:00.000-07:00

I'm working on another floral shirt, this one is for my friend Becca.

I'm really loving the larger flowers on this, I made them a bit bigger than on my orange one. In return Becca made me these beautiful necklaces:This clasp is my favorite part! It's gorgeous.
These are beaded balls, very neat.

Aren't they amazing?! They've really inspired me to go to the bead store and spend my gift certificate from my birthday last August, and start beading, so I signed up for a class on June 16th. I love them, thanks Becca!

Doctored Cake Mix: Cherry Chocolate Cupcakes

2010-05-22T07:00:00.000-07:00

I took these tasty little cupcakes to a BBQ. It was a lazy Sunday and I wanted to make something simple. So, I took a "milk chocolate" cake mix, chopped up about 25 maraschino cherries and tossed them into the batter and baked. Easy Easy.
The frosting was a wee bit of a disaster. Here is the recipe I was supposed to use:

3 3/4 cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted
1/2 cup butter, softened
4 tbsp. (or more) maraschino cherry juice

But I thought "hmmm....if 4 tbs of cherry juice is good...8 will be better! Or, I'll just pour the whole thing into the mix!" um, no, it doesn't work like that. The frosting was weird and chunky, and couldn't hold those pretty cherries. By the time we got to the BBQ it looked like a brain explosion in my container :(

Oh well, they are still delicious and you should still make them...but follow the recipe for the frosting :)

A few cards

2010-05-20T07:00:00.000-07:00

A few days before Mother's Day I whipped together these cards for my Mama and my MIL. I'm having fun digging through my "stash" of old scrapbooking stuff and finally getting some use from it. I have supplies that are 10 years old! That's practically half of my life!

The white flowers are these amazing rub-ons from Stampin' Up. I got them for my birthday last year, but this is the first time I've used them and I LOVE them! They look so clean and professional. Love.

Black Magic Cake

2010-05-18T07:00:00.000-07:00

I had been planning on making strawberry cupcakes for Mother's Day dinner, but my brother (who was pretty adorable in trying to plan the perfect mother's day dinner) thought everyone would like Chocolate better. So I turned to my trusty favorite allrecipes.com at the eleventh hour and found a chocolate cake recipe that used ingredients that I already had on hand.
It came together quickly and easily, and was pretty darn tasty! The chocolate flavor was really light, so next time I make this cake I plan to toss some mini chocolate chips into the batter before cooking to add some more chocolatelyness.

Black Magic Cake

Ingredients

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups white sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup strong brewed coffee
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour two 9 inch round cake pans or one 9x13 inch pan.
In large bowl combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Make a well in the center.
Add eggs, coffee, buttermilk, oil and vanilla. Beat for 2 minutes on medium speed. Batter will be thin. Pour into prepared pans.
Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 30 to 40 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into center of cake comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes, then remove from pans and finish cooling on a wire rack. Fill and frost as desired.

Making a Great bow

2010-05-16T09:47:00.000-07:00

I worked in a flower shop for two years, and one of my main jobs was making those big, gorgeous bows that flower shops put on everything. And I really did put them on everything! Some days when the shop was slow, I'd do nothing but make bows. Of course, I hated it then, but now I'm glad I had that experience.
While I was at a craft store a few weeks ago I overheard a conversation about bow making, a man had asked an employee to make him some bows and she said she didn't know how, and called over another employee who also didn't know how. So, I thought I'd share my flower shop bow making technique in case you work at a craft store and need to know how to make a bow...

1. Make a circle around your finger. Be sure the ribbon goes around the circle 1.5 times, or it will slip later.

2. Twist the ribbon under your circle, then make a loop, then twist the ribbon when it is under the circle again, and make another loop on the other side (this is if your ribbon only has a design on one side, like the satin ribbon I am using here. You twist so that the pretty stuff is always on the outside. If you're using two sided ribbon, skip the twist.)

3. Continue step 2, making each set of loops a tiny bit larger than the last, until you think your bow is long enough.

4. Cut a piece of ribbon at least 4" long, thread it through your orignal circle and around all of your loops and tie it. If you'd like your bow to have "tails", make this piece of ribbon longer, and the two ends will become your tails. (sorry no pic, but this step requires both hands!)

5. Fluff up your loops, and pull them into the position that you want them.6. Cut the ends of the tails at an angle to make a V in them.

that's it. It's pretty simple and once you do it a few hundred times you'll be a pro! When you're first starting out, use wired ribbon. It makes your loops hold their shape better and is so much easier to work with.

Fondant!

2010-05-09T10:11:00.000-07:00

We celebrated mothers day yesterday with my family, and I figured it was the perfect excuse to play in fondant. I've never made fondant before, I don't think I've ever even tasted it, but Bake@350 posted a very easy recipe for it last week and I figured it couldn't hurt to try it.

I had imagined a cake with daisies on it, but JoAnn's didn't have the fondant cutters in the flower shape I wanted, so I bought a leaf shape and handmade the flowers instead.

Leave my countertops alone! They're antiques!

This was really, really easy to make, and I love the results. (it tastes like solid sugar. Not a bad taste, but very sweet!) And it's super fun to play with, like play dough for grown ups.

There was a lot of touching involved, so I was a little squeamish about it, but you hands have to be coated in Crisco at all times, so that was enough of a barrier that I was okay with it :)

Here is my final result:

I'll post the recipe for this cake soon. It was really good!

Mother's Day Gifts

2010-05-04T09:08:00.000-07:00

If there was a contest for weirdest family tradition, I'm pretty sure mine would win. There's one goal at holidays that we all strive for: make mom cry. At prayer before dinner everyone passes her their napkins, and then we all giggle when she actually has to use them. Yeah, we're mean. Anyways, my point is, I think my mother's day gift is going to be a winner, so pass the napkins!

A few weeks ago Sarah from He Coaches She Crafts posted this adorable plaque that she made for her mother using a cricut. When I whined that I didn't have a cricut but loved the idea, Sarah suggested that I go to Wordle.net and create a collage there. What a great idea!

I used Sarah's tutorial to make two plaques, one for my mom and one for Dimples' mom. For my mom I chose the words for mom (mother, mom, mama...yes I call my mom "mama" still), and words that I thought described my mom, like beautiful, caring and loving etc.
For Dimples' mom I chose their last name to be the focal point, then love, home and family. Then I used thesaurus.com to find other words that meant love, family and home, and chose the ones I thought described his family best.

And I really loved how they turned out. I think they are so sweet, and I'm glad that I took the time to make something instead of just buying something like I usually do.

sorry, I had to black out our last name there.

And mom, if you're reading this, you know you're going to have to pretend to be surprised and cry for me later. Happy Mother's Day!

"Hawaiian" fruit dip

2010-04-27T07:00:00.000-07:00

I was invited to a Hawaiian themed birthday party a few weeks ago and spent some time googling trying to come up with something clever to bring. I came across this recipe in a About.com answer and although I was unsure there was really anything "Hawaiian" about it, thought it sounded pretty tasty. And it was! This is definitely something I'll keep on hand during the summer when our house is over run with fruit. It comes together really quickly and adds an unexpected lime pop to fresh fruit.

Hawaiian Fruit Dip
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup sour cream
1 (3 1/2 ounce) package instant vanilla pudding
1 (8 ounce) can crushed pineapple with juice, undrained
1/3 cup sweetened flaked coconut, toasted
1 lime

Combine milk, sour cream, and pudding mix; whisk until smooth.
Stir in pineapple and coconut.
Zest lime to measure 1 teaspoon zest; juice lime to measure 1 teaspoon juice.
Stir both into dip.
Cover and refrigerate at least 30 minutes before serving.
To toast coconut, preheat oven to 350º; spread coconut onto cookie sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes until light golden brown.
Serve with fresh sliced fruits.

3 years down, only 80 to go

2010-04-24T07:00:00.000-07:00

Today is our third wedding anniversary. I know I say it every year, but I can't believe this much time has passed already! I hope the next 80 years of our marriage are this easy and wonderful. I'm a really lucky lady.

Amazing Carrot Cake

2010-04-22T07:00:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday was Dimples' birthday, and as is tradition, I needed to make an awesome cake. Last year, much to my dismay, he requested funfetti (what adult wants a funfetti cake for their birthday?!). This year he requested carrot cake.
I was a little nervous because I've never made a carrot cake before, but I knew Dimples' aunt had an awesome recipe, so I emailed her to request it.

I multiplied the recipe 1.5 so I could have three layers of deliciousness. I didn't quite have enough frosting, so I had to make do. a This really is the best carrot cake I've ever had!

Cake

2 cups sugar
1 cup corn oil
3 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups unbleached all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon Cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup canned drained unsweetened crushed pineapple
3 cups packed grated peeled carrots
1 cup chopped walnuts
1 cup shredded sweetened coconut.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. butter 2 9 inch cake pans with 2 inch high sides. Line pans with waxed paper. Beat sugar, oil, eggs and vanilla in large bowl to blend. Sift flour, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon and salt into sugar mixture. Beat to blend. Puree pineapple in processor until smooth. Add to batter. Stir in carrots, walnut and coconut. Divide batter between prepared pans. Bake cakes until tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 40 minutes. Transfer to racks. Cool 15 minutes. Cut around sides of pan to loosen cakes. Turn cakes out onto racks. Remove waxed paper. Cool cakes completely.

Cream Cheese Frosting

2- 8 ounce packages of cream cheese
3/4 stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter room temperature
2 cups powdered sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Beat cream cheese and butter in medium bowl until smooth. Sift powdered sugar into mixture. Beat until smooth. Beat in vanilla. Place 1 cake layer on platter. Spread 3/4 cup frosting over top. Top with second cake layer. Spread remaining frosting in swirls over top and sides of cake. Chill until firm, about 1 hour. Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover, chill. Let stand at room temperature 30 minutes before serving.

So, happy birthday hun! I'm looking forward to making you many more birthday cakes :)