Old Fashioned Bread Box

I was so excited when I found this old bread box at DI! These have been really popular lately so I was really excited to make it cute and stick it in my kitchen! I spray painted the whole thing white and then roughed it up with sand paper and stuck it in my kitchen! I loved it!....for a second, then realized it just wasn't me and it would sit there, unused, and taking up precious counter space. This made it a perfect item to trade at the Summer Extravaganza for something different! Yay! Too bad it didn't turn out to be all I had hoped for, but I'm hoping it made someone else very happy :)



Turquise Chevron Cork Board

For the Treasure Trade I also made this fun, cute cork board for décor. We had this old huge cork board just hangin' around and were just about to toss it when I thought, hey! Why don't I just paint it? The pins will still stick right into it just fine! I wanted to paint it turquoise chevron so I could hang it in my kid's playroom to hang all their artwork on (instead of in my kitchen, haha) AND it would be perfect as décor for the Treasure Trade! Voila! ...and just like that another project idea is born! I just used regular Valspar wall paint, since that is what I had on hand and rolled it on just as if I was painting my walls! My taping wasn't up to par for Paul so he did all his measurements to make this chevron look good! Haha! Thanks babe!

 Here it is all dressed up pretty for the Treasure Trade! :)

Summer Extravaganza 2013 Treasure Trade!

This year, again, I was in charge of designing the flyer we send out to neighborhood friends. I LOVE coming up with new designs in my scrapbook program and just having fun with it! This is what I came up with this time:

We were each in charge of coming up with 4 or more banners to help with decorating as well. These are super fun to get creative a put together! Since I have the luxury of cheap/free printing, I went that route on some of mine and even did a few extra :) I found this free printable polka-dot one in a few different colors. I just printed a few copies of the banner and picked out the colors I wanted. I found the link here: partyplan-itdesigns.blogspot.com. Super easy. I just strung it with jute and added a few different colors of ribbon in between each pennant. LOVE it!

 This banner was a fun one. We made up these super cute invites inspired by: michellewooderson.blogspot.com. They were simple to make with a paper bag, cut down to size, a strip of colorful paper, stitched by machine with a fun color, then we added some cute ric-rac and a couple different textured ribbons tied onto the front! Then we threw in a few tags and some cards with info I created to coordinate with the flyer I made. We finished it off with a nametag with a punched flower on it to add some character and color

 They turned out SUPER cute! I love them! We just have so much fun getting creative and crafting together for this fun event!

 Here is another banner just like the first one I showed. I made 2 of these. The lighting is bad, so you can't really see it, sorry

 Here is a close-up. We had decided the colors we wanted to use for the Trade were: orange, turquoise, lime green, and yellow. So like I said, I just picked those colors out of the printable and made my own! The great thing is, the colors left were pink and purple....PERFECT for a girly party later down the road.... I NEVER throw scraps like that away!

 This banner was a fun one! I took scraps of fabric in the 4 colors we decided on and tore them into 1 inch strips in various lengths and just tied them along a piece of jute (which BTW, has become my new best friend) and then I added pieces of turquoise tulle to the mix and it added a whole new dimension! This one was definitely a favorite!

 I used the same fabrics as the one above to make this banner. I just cut triangles out of each color of fabric and ran them through my sewing machine on some yellow ribbon! I then used turquoise and lime green tulle and tied pieces in between each pennant and cut them into circle shapes! I just used up all the scraps for the one above after I made this one! I really don't think I paid a cent for any of my banners... just a bunch of scraps I had on hand!

 This banner was another one I had printed that says LEMONADE in yellow. I found the free printable here lemonademoments.com! You can't see it well in the pic, but if you click on the link you will see how stinkin' cute it really is! ....and just because I had it printed, I used some smaller square pieces for a tiny banner for down below. Each piece says Lemonade and once again, if you click on the link you will see them on the printable. Nothing says Summer quite like Lemonade!

The Summer Extravaganza Treasure Trade was so much fun to put together with my favorite girls! Thanks Amy, Jen, Kim, and Natalie! So much fun!

 

More pics of the actual event to come....

Colin's Green Dinosaur 3rd Birthday Party!

For Colin's 3rd Birthday he really wanted a Green Dinosaur Birthday Party! Here is the announcement I made for it. I let him pick out what he wanted on it and he really liked these dinosaur guys :)

I really wanted to attempt his birthday cake myself, but being pregnant with contractions, I needed to eliminate some of the stress and so that meant the cake had to be it. I have this awesome cake lady who I have had do cakes for me before and she is amazing! I just sent her a picture and she created this from it! Love her!

 One thing I was NOT going to give up on was this DINOsaur tail! I had seen it before, but wanted to make one for him to wear on his birthday! I found this tutorial on tatertotsandjello.com and it was really super simple. He loved it and wore it almost the whole day! We had also just put in a new sandbox that we hid some dinosaur bones in for the kids to dig up! That was the best part of the party! So much fun!

 I found this FREE Dinosaur Party printable at lovelyliving.com that made things super easy. It had all the banners, birthday hats, and straw flags as well as a whole lot more that I ended up not using. I used the idea from celebrationsathomeblog.com to add spikes to the back of the Dinosaur hats! I also made up some cute signs for all the table items that matched Colin's birthday party announcements. Everyone loved the Dino Droppings and Dino Bones! The Droppings were Junior Mints and the Bones were small straight pretzels with a mini marshmallow on each end dipped in white chocolate! Mmmmm. Those were yummy to make and went suuper fast!

Colin had a super fun Green Dinosaur Party and was in heaven the whole time! He even still refers to everything green as "like my Green Dinosaur Party" such a funny kid! Happy Birthday Love!

Black Bean and Cheese Flautas

If there is anyone who loves Mexican food, it is me, all the way! I get so excited about anything that looks yummy that has a Mexican ring to it! Mmmm. I found this recipe for Black Bean and Cheese Flautas and HAD to try it out! The recipe is found at peasandcrayons.com and if you're brave, you can make them with sweet potatoes, but I am not a fan, so I substituted my sweet potatoes for good ol' chicken. These were absolutely delicious! Try it out!