halloween pom pom garland

Brianna invited me over the other night to make a Halloween pom pom garland. If you have a pom pom maker, these things are pretty easy, but they definitely take time. It actually took us 2 nights of pom pom making to get enough for the garlands. After they were all done, I tied them onto black yarn/floss. I used the width of my hand from thumb to pinky to measure (totally accurate measurements). I didn't go in a pattern which I like better. I love how it turned out, but I don't really love where it's hanging. I'm still trying to figure out what to do about that. Until I figure out something better, it's hanging on the kitchen blinds.

Halloween Crafting

celsey, her mom, aunt, and cousin, and i made these awesome halloween crafts last weekend. mucho thanks to her mom and aunt for doing the majority of the work. i basically have no where to put such cute things so on the kitchen table it is. i need to get a better picture of the alien with the earrings and the teeth. it will make you want to die of cuteness.

freezer paper stencil apron

celsey's husband shawn had a birthday a couple weeks ago. because he has such an awesome wife, he got a present every hour of his birthday. we got together one day when he was gone hunting to craft an apron for grilling.

it was fairly easy and pretty quick. grab some freezer paper, pencil, print out of what you want to stencil, exacto knife, and paint and paintbrush.

1. iron whatever you are going to stencil on

2. print out a stencil, put under freezer paper and trace

3. cut out stencil with exacto. be very careful in your cutting

4. iron stencil onto fabric. make sure to iron really well. any spots not ironed well will cause paint to bleed.

5. paint over stencil. may require a couple of coats of paint. make sure to let thoroughly dry in between.

6. remove freezer paper and voila

Girl Baby Gift

church friend paige had a baby shower back in april. since i couldn't make it to the shower i never finished the baby gift. i found these itty bitty flip flops at old navy and sincerely just about died. i made this birdie onesie a while ago and decided to make a matchy matchy skirt. i already made the itty bitty felt bow that is barely showing in the corner. i sewed this and a few other itty bitties tonight. i just finished cleaning it all up, when i got a text from paige saying baby aspen is here. talk about perfect timing. can't wait to see her in this little number. all this girl baby stuff nearly kills me it's so cute.

Circus Shower

Celsey and I hosted a circus themed baby shower for churchy friends Jenny and Lindsey. The theme was so cute and fun, and the food was even better. Too bad we were in the kitchen 95% of the shower and didn't get many pictures...blogger fail. We had elephant cake, peanuts, popcorn, homemade churros, pretzel dogs, lemonade, and cotton candy. We decorated the table with popcorn containers full of peanuts, tickets, red, yellow, and blue circles, and party hats. I really am so sad I didn't get better pictures.

Graduation Craft

Churchy friend Lindsey B graduated last week. It was the perfect excuse to make these cutest little graduation treats. We used this tutorial from bakerella and changed it up a little. We used plain hershey bars for the top. I'm still dying at the cuteness of the little things.

congrats Lindsey B on graduating

Life is a Circus...

...and we're adding 2 more Acts

Former BYU co-worker and post college roommate Amanda and husband Jeff are having twins. Celsey and I made this circus cake for their gender reveal party. We are definitely still in the learning phase with this whole cakeing thing (like how in the world do you get the fondant to not tear?), but we are having a lot of fun figuring it out. This was the first time we delivered the cake straight to the party. We loved the reactions of everyone. Congrats Amanda and Jeff on 2 baby BOYS!

i thought i got my lens fixed on my phone yesterday, but apparently i am still taking crappy cell phone pics

birthday party invitations

When super crafty co-worker Emily emailed me and asked if she could hire me to make her son's birthday party invitations, I got nervous. She is way more crafty than I am but just didn't have the time to pull something together. The party didn't really have a theme except it was a mixed gender party for a boy turning 11. Talk about scary... I got on pinterest and found some cute ideas. I mostly followed this tutorial from Capernaum Home.

get ready for lots of tracing and lots of cutting. a cricut would have been really helpful

after all the cutting, i did lots of writing with all the party details. 

glue with hot glue. i started with a glue stick, and it just wasn't sticky enough. i mostly use hot glue for everything.

i didn't take pictures the confetti i put inside with the pendants. this is a toilet paper roll wrapped in wrapping paper. this was the worst step of the whole thing.

i was pretty happy with the way they turned out, and emily and her son loved them...phew

We're BEARY excited

to meet our baby boy or girl

these pictures don't do this justice at all. so cute!

the latest gender reveal cake was this cute little bear. we did a practice on the right for a baby blessing. one of my college friends is pregnant with her first, and it was so much fun making this gender reveal for her. we're all BEARY excited to meet her baby BOY!

next up...gender reveal for chelsea and jeff. they had the ultrasound last week and are waiting until we cut the cake to find out the gender. i'm so excited to make this cake and for the mail to come so i know the gender.

Easter Crafts

Celsey found these cute crafts so we got together with her family and got to work. Her mom cut all the wood in her very own wood shop (mega jealous). We used the cricut for the lettering and mod podged it all together. So very cute!

nettie's bridal shower

i finally got the pictures from roommate nettie's bridal shower. by the time you're 31 and single, you know a heckuva lot of people. good thing michelle has the perfect house for a big party. i didn't get very good pictures of well any of it, but we had cute decor, yummy food (yogurt bar and crepes), and lots of friends. it was so much fun to see all our old friends and celebrate nettie's upcoming wedding.

 pendant banner and a few of our turnberry friends/old roommate

 opening gifts

 sugarhouse friends and a little peak of the decorations

old rommates

shower with lots of friends are my favorite kinds. such a fun day.

Not Tonight Pillow

I saw something similar to this pillow online somewhere and unfortunately couldn't find it again. I wish I could credit the place I got the idea, but I seriously can't find it. As soon as Nettie got engaged, I HAD to make it. I think it's so funny.

I took crappy phone pictures of the process. Side not...I just realized my phone pictures are so crappy because my camera lens has a few cracks in it. It might be time for a new phone soon. Until then, here is the crappy picture step by step of the Not Tonight Pillow.

trace stencil (printed from word with a font i liked) onto freezer paper (i got mine from a co-worker but apparently it can be found by the wax paper at the grocery store) shiny side down.

cut out stenciled letters with an exacto knife

iron on stencil to the fabric. make sure it's a good seal so paint doesn't seap through.

paint. a few tutorials used different types of paint and mixed paint types. i used regular acrylic craft paint, and it worked fine. i did 3-4 coats to make sure it was dark/heavy enough to show up

after the paint dries, peel off the stencil.

cover with light material and iron over the words to seal

now it's time to sew. i'm not even going to pretend to know the best way to sew a pillow. these were my first pillows ever, and i'm sure i could use a few tips myself.

finished product

i made 2 pillows because i couldn't decide which one i liked better. the writing doesn't show up quite as well on this one, but i still love it.
co-worker michelle made one out of burlap this week, and it turned out so very cute.

beach cake

celsey's cousin, morgan, is going on a mission to perth, australia. she was asked to make a cake for his farewell . celsey came up with the design for this beach themed cake. 

we've only made a few cakes, but we learn as we go. we got together friday and baked the cakes, rolled out the fondant and cut the letters, made the rice krispy treat for the wave, and made the flowers. celsey used fondant on the ducky cake, but it was my first time with fondant and both of our first time with gum paste. she found a tutorial on youtube for the plumeria flowers. i was skeptical at first, but as soon as we painted them i wanted to die at how cute they were.

we spent the day saturday assembling it all. we decided we needed another bottom layer so we baked another cake. this thing was massive-6 cake mixes, 2 containers of frosting, 1 lb of fondant, a whole batch of rice krispy treats, some food coloring and paint, 2 mermaids, and the perfect surfer.

after cute*ing our heads off for 2 straight days, we couldn't have been happier with the way the cake turned out. we were literally dying at the cuteness.

thanks to celsey's brother brandon for helping us with the flowers and our structural engineer shawn for helping us figure out how to get the wave to work.

another gender reveal

same girl. 2 cakes. 2 themes.

cake #1 for her family...rub a dub dub is it a boy or girl in the tub?

it's a boy! it takes a heckuvalot of food coloring, but eventually the cake is the just right blue.

cake #2 for the youth at church. waddle it be???

husbands are handy to have around. shawn is our structural cake engineer. i think he secretly loves it.

sadly i was out of town the weekend of the gender reveal. i was only here for the baking part which started disastrous. the  pan is meant to cook the whole duck together, but it was such a mess. we decided to bake both halves separately. it worked so much better. we also used shortening and flour rather than cooking spray. it made all the difference. the cake came out perfectly. i was way sad to miss the decorating part of the cakes. both of them turned out so cute.

crochet boots

these darling little boots are to die for cute. ruby's grandma made these for her, and i nearly died at the cuteness. too bad my crochet skills are sub par. i really want to make these.

Skip Work and Craft

Friday was skip work and craft day. We had a pretty good turn out and made some great projects. Holly crocheted premie hats. Aly made baby Brown some burp clothes. Charity did some mending. Michelle and Kimber made earrings, and Kimber made a skirt and shirt. Brianna, Mikael and I made felt bows, and I made some buttons. I love skip work and craft day!