Front Entry Facelift!

My front entry is now one of my favorite places. Before I gave it a new look it was a sad, dreary place. All that lived there was a tired, washed out rocking chair I got at a rummage sale for 15 bucks. While checking my mail one day I realized this is the first impression you have of my home and knew right away I needed to fix this. I am also painfully aware that my house needs a paint job. We purchased a fixer upper and almost everything needed to be redone....this is on our long list. ;)

This was it before, minus the table....sad right. :( I sanded down the chair really well and cleaned the daylights out of  it. Then gave it a couple good coats of paint. I used "Gentle Rain" by Behr. It is a  beautiful blueish gray. So when all was said and done I had a beautiful chair but it still needed help.

We had just painted our patio and gone through all the planters and little tables we had. I came across this neglected little stand and knew it was perfect. Sorry it isn't a great pic but it I (being my forgetful self) forgot to get a good pic of it.

I gave it a good cleaning, sanded the rough spots, and cleaned a little more.

The top was a pretty washed out and dirty. I gave it a good scrub and went in search for my spray paint colors. With a little paint and painters tape this is what I ended up with. I am very happy with how this dreary little table came to life. I used aqua, red, and white spray paint.

 I also added a pretty white planter found at a garage sell. Do you like my pretty mums? So what do you think? I am in love. I sit and read my mail here while watching my boys play. It is wonderful.  Just remember next time you come across a "seen better  days" item in or around your household take a second look ....it could be your wonderful.

Linking up with ... Beneath My Heart

Happy Belated Thanksgiving!!!

Happy belated Thanksgiving to everyone! We hosted Thanksgiving this year and I did the black Friday sells so I have had no time for blogging.  Our meal went beautifully and I got some great deals. I hope everyone had a great holiday!!

Monster Birthday Bash!

My little monster E just turned 1!  His birthday is right before Halloween so we decided to have a Monster themed party.

I had a vision of what I wanted the cake to look like and I am pretty happy with the finished product.  I baked a chocolate pound cake in a 13 x 9 pan and carved out my monster. I used a star tip (17...I think that is the number of the one I used). Yes, it takes forever piping all those little stars but I love how it looks when you are done.I used just your basic butter cream recipe with food gel coloring.  His hat was the smash cake. We had a great time and my little monster really enjoyed his party. 

We had some yummy cake pops.  I found this site to be most helpful when making my cake pops...Bakerella These were a big hit. Inside there was chocolate cake with strawberry frosting.

I couldn't find any invitations I liked so I pulled out some card stock and made my own. I found the shape of my monsters from a fabric sample. I didn't use any special machines (although I would love to have a Silhouette... Ahem Santa) I simply drew out a template of each monster and used it for all the cards.  Excuse the roughed up invites. K and E decided these needed to be dissected and inspected. Of course they took the only one I kept for the scrap book and destroyed it. I was able to salvage it, thankfully. ;) Little monsters.

For favors we did Jolly Rancher Lollies with all kinds of candy pressed into the lollies. Somehow I don't have a photo of these but they were awesome. I have a few left so I will take photos and either update this post or do a new one.

During the party I was running around playing hostess and wasn't in control of the picture taking. Unfortunately there aren't many shots of the decor but I made some of these from the Martha Stewart site. We also had a frankenstein, mummy, monster,and a scarecrow one. They were super cute.

Pic from marthastewart.com

I also made this cool bat mobile from the Martha site to hang over the table...

Pic from marthastewart.com

We had an awesome time and E had a wonderful birthday. K has already informed me that he wants a birthday soon and he wants it to be Mickey mouse. LoL

I also wanted to add if you have never tried homemade butter cream, you should. It taste much better than the can stuff. IMO. Here is the recipe if anyone wants to try it. This is for the true white icing. The other method for making butter cream uses 1/2 cup butter and 1/2 cup shortening in place of 1 cup of shortening and no butter flavor.

Butter Cream Icing

1 cup vegetable shortening

4 cups confectioners sugar

1 tsp of clear vanilla extract

1/2 tsp butter flavor (clear)

2-4 tablespoons milk

Place shortening in the mixer and mix on love for a minute just to break it up a bit. Add your vanilla and butter flavor. Set mixer on low and  slowly add your sugar. Once it is all in the bowl and mixed turn on medium until mixed well. It will be quite stiff. Add 2 tablespoons of milk and beat on med., scraping the sides often until you get a fluffy icing. You made need to add a little more milk. If so, add 1 tablespoon at a time. Keep refrigerated when not using it or cover with a damp cloth. Again is the pure white recipe used for adding color. I have found this to be the best method for getting better color.

This will keep in the fridge for about 2 weeks in a sealed container.

Thank You Veterans!

I just wanted to say a quick Thank You to all the Men and Women who so proudly serve/served our country. Thank you also to the family of those who serve and have served. It is a great honor to have such honorable people standing up for our country. On a more personal note Thank you to my late Grandfather who served in the Army, My Father-In-Law  retired Air-force, Two aunts who were in the Army and Navy, and lastly my father who desperately wanted to serve but was never able to. He is almost completely deaf so he did not meet the medical requirements. He still tried and there is  something to be said for trying. ;)

      ~God Bless America and the Women and Men who protect it~

  Happy Veterans Day!!!

Sumo Baby Halloween Costume!

So this year K insisted on being Iron man. I did not feel up to the challenge of making an Iron man outfit so we bought one. E  is too young to choose so Dad had a brilliant idea. Sumo Baby! He is around 23 pounds and quite the chunky little monkey. So it was a go. I did a lot of research on the actual Sumo gear and took notes. It was surprisingly simple to sew and I personally loved it....I will let you be the judge...

I couldn't find a wig in his size so I made a crochet beanie with a folded ponytail in back.

Here is a view of the back. I think it is such a funny costume. All the people handing out candy really got a kick out of the suit.

I am going to try to break down the construction in words. I did this the day before Halloween so no process pics. Sorry...i am a slacker. :) It is a basic T shape. I measured my son's waist and divided by two. With that number I cut a small piece of foam. Then I took the waist measurements and added a little length so I would have enough tail to tie it twice. I decided how wide I wanted it and then doubled the number. So I cut my waist band and folded in half. I sewed the length of the waist band and left the ends open. I slid my foam in, centered it, and then sewed the fabric closed on each end of the fabric to hold my foam in place. I turned and pressed the ends of the waist band and top stitched closed.

For the flap I just eyeballed the length. You want it long enough to come over the waist band and then a few extra inches. I simply cut a rectangle as wide as the front of my sons diaper and hemmed the edges. Turn your waist band right side facing down and attach the flap to the bottom inside of the waist band under the foam. I did gather mine just a tad. You are done. It is that simple. I put it around his waist and made 1 simple knot in the back. Take your flap and come down over the front of the diaper, when you are half way down start twisting the fabric to get the look in the back. Bring your twist up over your knot and use those extra inches of the waist tail to make another knot over the flap.  Tuck the remaining flap around the waist band  and you should be left with two small tail pieces sticking out. That is the look you want. I believe I have it in a pic above. If I have done a horrible job explaining this please email me and I will try to explain better.

For the hat I did a simple beanie and added the flaps in like you would ear flaps just on the crown of the head. I started large and decreased down to the base on the top flap. the bottom flap I left the same size from beginning to end so it would resemble the thickest part of the pony tail.

I also threw together a quick diaper coverTutorial Here @ Danamadeit and  robe. It isn't very cold yet but can get slightly cool at night so I thought the robe was a nice little wind blocker. Although he really didn't need it.

I hope I explained everything ok. Again if I didn't feel free to comment or email me and I will try to give you a better description.

~I hope you all had a Happy Halloween!~

Roast Pumpkin and Pumpkin seeds! Yum!

I can't remember where I seen or read it but I saw method for roasting Pumpkins whole. Of course I had to try it. It was really easy and the results were really good. I had purchased two pie pumpkins when we went to

our local pumpkin patch so they were my frankin-pumpkins. ;)

I washed them very well and coated them with Canola oil. I placed them in a 425 degree oven for about an hour and 15 minutes. Times may vary depending on the size of you pumpkin(s). Now you need to make sure to put them on one of the wire racks of your oven and place the other rack under them with a cookie sheet lined with foil to catch any dripping juice.

They are done when you can run a knife through and the flesh is soft like butter. Now I don't know if I cooked mine a little to long but the skin was shell like and very hard so it took a little muscle to get through the outer shell to check the flesh. When they are done let cool a little and slice in half. Be careful there may be some steam. I scooped out my seeds and then my flesh and was left with these wonderful shells. Save these.  I am thinking they may make some cute decor with a little work. That will be another post.

~Updated~ It is bad news for these pumpkins. I had to throw them away.
:( I think I should  have really scrubbed them out with a Brillo pad and let them dry in the sun. I thought a light scrubbing would do and just let then dry on the counter. Well not so much. They started to get a little moldy and I decided to pitch them.  Maybe next year. I will really scrub them really well and either dry them in the oven or if it is sunny out on the patio.

Here are my yummy roasted seeds. Cook on 400 degrees for about 10-20 minutes depending on how many seeds you have. I coated them in 2 tablespoons of melted butter and a little kosher salt. They were ready about 15 minutes after I put them in the oven. Be careful they burn quickly.

My two small pie pumpkins produced one gallon zip loc baggie.

For best results puree your pumpkin before using. keep in the fridge until ready to use or place in your freezer for future use.

Happy roasting!

An oraganized and decluttered Medicine Cabinet :)

So the other day Mr. Wonderful says to me " Do we really need to keep the boxes and papers to all these meds?"  Well of course we need to keep these, crazy. He doesn't like clutter at all. So I thought of a quick fix that would keep us both happy. This....

Now let me explain.....

I took out all of our medications and  separated them by what they were for and who they were for. Then I took all the boxes and paper work out. I like to keep the boxes and paper work because sometimes they say more than the bottle and what happens if I need that info and the box is in the trash.

I forgot to take a pic but all these boxes were in this cabinet with the below items. I sorted this a little in the bottom pic because I was to embarrassed to show you how crazy it was in there. :-O

I cut all the boxes down to only kept the important parts. On the underside of these boxes I wrote notes that come to mind with each medication that I felt was  need to know info.

I then found my hole punch, a freezer bag, screw hook and a drill.

I punched a hole in the top of the ziploc under the threads where it would hold up to hanging.

I pre-drilled a small hole that would accommodate my screw hook in my cabinet door. Make sure this won't interfere with your cabinet door shutting. You may have to place it in a certain spot so it isn't in the way.

Placed all my info, thermometers, and little misc. items that were lying around the cabinet into the ziploc.

Then I placed my baggie onto the hook. They are all  together in the cabinet and everyone is happy. 

Our meds are all in place by person, purpose, and use.

Now I can look at this cabinet and know exactly where everything is and have everything I need without the clutter. Mr. Wonderful had a great idea. He said I should sew a fabric bag with a vinyl front so it would hold up longer. Awesome idea....now just to get around to it. I have a to-do list longer than the Mississippi. Ha! I will get to it though....that ziploc will only hold up for so long.

Hope this gave you some ideas in your own home.

~Making colored sugar with gel food color~

 For the upcoming holidays I thought it would be fun to do holiday sugar. I usually have play dates every week or so and almost always have the in-laws over so it is nice to offer festive sugar with their coffee. It was such a hit I  ran out with out taking a picture of it in my pretty sugar jar. I plan to make some more soon and will add a pic then.

To get the above affect you will need:

Food coloring

( I had gel on hand but I am sure any food color will work....just read the color chart on the back)

Sugar

Cup, Bowl, or Zip lock baggie

Spoon

Pour your desired amount of sugar into a cup, bowl or zip loc. Now also keep in my the amount of sugar you use will determine the amount of food coloring you will use. I have a small sugar dish so I didn't need a lot.

Reading the back of the food color box I got the right amount of red and yellow to make Orange and then the amounts for green. If you are using gel and a bowl or cup just use a spoon like this. If you are using a bag place the gel directly onto the inside of your bag. Just keep in mind you may need to add more color depending on the amount of sugar.

Then just mix well and pour onto a flat surface to dry.  There you have it, festive holiday sugar! I think I may make more for Thanksgiving in similar colors....maybe brown, red, and orange. Then Christmas colors....red, green, and white. Simply, easy holiday decor. Trust me all your visitors that come over for a cup of joe will enjoy this fun treat!

Baby Shower Goodies!

Don't you just love looking at little bitty baby stuff? I do. I also enjoy making it. This little loot of goodies is for a friend expecting a little boy at the end of the year. I hope she likes them. These are all pretty simple items to make but if anyone is interested I can do a tutorial on them or shoot them an email with the instructions. It was late and I had no time to take pictures of the process. ;(

The first item was a car seat canopy. I simple rectangle with cotton on one side and flannel on the other. I used wide, satin ribbon for the ties.

For the next item. I have been brushing up on my crochet skills. When I was little my grandmother taught me the basics. More recently I purchased the book the Happy Hooker and watched tons of tutorials. By the way youtube is awesome!  This is just a simple ear flap hat with braids. I think it took about an hour from start to finish. I love how quickly these work up.

Here is my trusty childhood Ewok modeling for me. It was late and he was the only willing model. LOL! Sorry for the not so great photos....like I said it was late so flash lighting.

Gotta love variegated yarn.

And lastly, burp cloths. These are simply rectangles with a mid line sewn for easy folding and decorative top stitching on the edges. I used a microfiber cloth on one side and flannel on the other. I used the shape and size of the microfiber cloth and just cut my flannel to size.

I hope this gives you some ideas next time you have a shower to attend. Your options are endless. I don't know about you guys but I absolutely love it when someone takes time to make myself or my children something.



P.S. Coming soon Halloween post...with a baby Sumo costume and post about some Mommy goodies I had ordered, received , and tested.