Butterfly Birthday Party Part I: The Fun

Little T turned the big 0-4 last week and we had a fancy butterfly party. Isn't my hubby the best Uncle ever?! Oh how I love to dress them up and make insane pictures.

I made a bunch of felt butterfly wands that were passed out when people came in. (I love how they came out. I took pics of the steps so a tutorial is coming.)

While we had lots of fun making and eating food, today I want to share all the non-food related party stuff, because let's face it the food deserves a post of it's own.

This was the first party that the kiddos were old enough to try to do activities. We did two. The first was this cool butterfly craft. It wasn't messy, I wasn't scared of kids spilling glue, or getting ink or paint on my stuff and it was really fun.

If you want to do it you'll need

• paper plates
• scissors (just one pair for the grown up)
• double sided tape
• googly eyes
• pipe cleaners
• foam sheets
• foam shape stickers or other stickers

(this is the first one L made, I think it's SO cute)
You cut the plates in half in a design and then help the kids take the pieces of plate to a long piece of foam. See how you'll get the basic butterfly shape. Have them pick out and add the pipe cleaner and googly eyes and let them stick whatever else on it they want. You can curl the pipe cleaners too for a different look. This entertained the two year olds and the 10 year old (and one 30 something year old ahem Kelli).

Next we played 'pin the butterfly on the flower'. The musicmaker drew a giant flower and we stuck it to the wall. The kiddos got these cool fairy butterfly stickers to use.

They had so much fun. They all took multiple turns and raced through the stickers. Some with so much more accuracy than others that we were reminded how we would totally peek when we played the game when we were young.

We sang happy birthday and opened presents. T squealed with delight opening every present in such an insane flurry that all of those pictures were crazy blurry.

And of course we enjoyed just hanging out, lots of grown up chatting, kiddo dancing and kid wrangling. I'm pretty sure Langdon is going to be a football player when he grows up.

All the kiddos were sent home with these flipping cute butterfly goodie bags that my sister and the naughties made up. All they did was by decorate clothes pins with googly eyes, pipe cleaner antennae and clip them to those small zip top bags. Thanks to BakedBree for the cute idea.

It was so much fun, it really makes me want to have more get-togethers more often.  Anyways check back in on Friday for the food post.

UPDATE: Click here to see the part II of this post, the food.

Giveaway: Sara Seeton Photography

I'm participating in a super huge giveaway to help Sara Seeton Photography celebrate their first year of business. The prizes total to over a 1200$ value. My measly contribution is the winner's choice of any pair of bottoms out of my shop. Check it out here. (psst I also gave out a discount code for the shop over there)

I know I've had an unusually high number of giveaways lately. This will probably be the last for a while though so if you want your chance for free raegun good, head on over.

Treasury Love: Spring Time in Europe

T's butterfly birthday party today was fantastic! I hope to show you pictures from it later this week. But after all the fun I'm too tuckered out to edit pictures tonight. So I hope you enjoy this stunning treasury from BrandisBowBoutique. I think it's gorgeous, I'm loving the simple freshness of it all. If you'd like to see the items up close or see what other things these talented sellers make click here.

What's for Dinner: Week 76

(corned beef and cabbage sandwiches, we had these almost every day for lunch last week)

For those of you are new  to my blog I write these weekly plans to help me spend less (I kinda of love grocery shopping, yea I know I'm weird), to save time and to try and help us eat in more often. Also I love knowing what other people eat so I thought it would be fun to share. For a while I'll be adding my plans for what greens. I'll be eating since one of my resolutions is to build a habit of introducing more green veggies into our diet. Maybe some day it'll be so normal for us that I won't have to mention them any more.

Nothing fancy to report on the food front.

Day	Main Meal	Goals (Veggies, Whole Grain, Fish)
Sunday	T's birthday party	Grains and nuts: Sandwich, granola bars, ww pasta Veggies: salad, Peas Fish:Talapia
Monday	Teriyaki steak mashed potatoes
Tuesday	Lemon Talapia Alfredo with peas
Wednesday	Pub Quiz
Thursday	Studio Day Eat Out
Friday	Panko Chicken and Spring Rolls
Saturday	The unknown frozen thing in the freezer (it may be pasticio)

Tutorial: Pennant, Page and Word Banners

With T's birthday party prep we've been making a lot of banners. They are one of the cheapest ways to make a party or theme pop. I've been meaning to write up a tutorial for the word banners that I had made for Christmas, ummm yeah months ago. So, to make up for the delay I'm going to give you a three-for-one. I'll show you how to make three different styles of banners: pennant, page and word.

The pennant or flag style banner is like the one I made for Harry Potter's Birthday party pictured above and for T's upcoming butterfly party pictured below. The page kind is probably the easiest and quickest but it still can look adorable. We used this for L's last birthday party and I think it was darling (yeah I know I still need to write a post for that, it was SO cute). Finally the word style is the most time consuming but it's still pretty cute. I made some of these for Christmas and will hopefully finish a generic birthday one that I can reuse for different people before T's party this Sunday.

What you need

Pennant Style Banner

• Paper 
• Paper Cutter or scissors and a sturdy hand
• Hole punch (I prefer the smaller sized ones as opposed to the school style ones)
• Ribbon or String
• Tape (optional)

 Page Style Banner

• Paper with letters printed on them (you can find fun fonts at 1001freefonts.com)
• Paper Cutter if you want to do half page sizes (that's what I did in the banner above)
• Hole punch (I prefer the smaller sized ones as opposed to the school style ones)
• Ribbon or String
• Tape (optional)

Word Style Banner

• Paper (or precut letters)
• Cutting machine (like a cricut or silhouette) OR a font you like and patience to trace it and cut it out by hand
  
• Hole punch (I prefer the smaller sized ones as opposed to the school style ones)
• Ribbon or String
• Tape (optional)

 What to do

• Prepare your shapes. For the pennants cut your paper into triangles, print your letters for the page style and for word style banners cut out your letters. If you don't have a cutting machine and don't mind taking the time you can either print out a font you like and trace the letters or if your cheap and don't want to waste paper and ink I've held the paper straight to the computer screen to trace letters before. This is the most time consuming part.
• Punch two holes on the top of each shape. Make sure they are far enough from the edge so they won't rip easily when you work with them
• Next you want to lay out  your pattern. Lay your pages, pennants or letters out how you want them to hang.
• Thread the ribbon through the holes. Decide ahead of time whether you want a stripe of ribbon to go in front or behind  your shape. Take your time you don't want to rip it after all that work.
• If you want tape the ribbon to the back of your shapes this will minimize the twisting and make it easier to untangle the banner (yes it'll get tangled when you try to hang it just expect it so it doesn't annoy you too much).
• Hang your banner and enjoy.

And if you've made a pennant one you probably have little scraps left from your flags. tape them onto skewers throw them in a glass or short vase and you've got yourself some super cute little flags. See em in action here.

Featured: Life of Toi

Tatiana of Life of Toi did a short interviewed with me yesterday. Feel free to check it out here if you're interested.

Fitness Journal: Week 27

This week has been annoying. I've felt hungry only a short time after eating, often. So I know I was at least 300 calories over for a chunk of days. I did up my exercise and this ALWAYS happens when I do that. Of course it's not proportional you know my hunger level for the extra calories level. but whatever.

In other news I did 2 pull ups in a row. And I did that 4 times. I feel like I'm definitely getting stronger and more fit. I kinda want to make it a goal to be strong enough that I can run away from bad guys jump up and grab something over head pull myself up all the way and escape. Do you think I've been watching too much Chuck?

Weight:

3/17/2011 145.5
3/24/2011 146
I'm 5'5 but have a small frame
(I think I'm going for 135 and we'll see from there)


Nutrition Breakdown:

daily calorie average:1630

Exercise:
H: Strength Training
F: Bike 30 min 5 mi Walk 30 min 1.6 mi
S: Bike 30 min 5 mi Walk 30 min 1.55 mi
S: Day off
M: Swim 60 min class 1400 yards
T: Strength Training
W: Bike 30 min 5 mi Walk 30 min 1.5 mi


Linking up at

Giveaway: Your Choice of Diaper Cover

I'm giving away one pair of my regular ruffle diaper covers over at Victoria Leigh Photography. The giveaway ends Monday, March 28th at 8:00am so check it, enter and spread the word. Winner gets to pick her (or his) choice of any one regular ruffle diaper cover in my shop.

Guest Blogging: Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky!

I know you guys enjoyed the chicken and veggie nugget recipe that Marigold from Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky! shared while I was on vacation. Today I'm sharing my recipe for Caramel Macadamia Nut Cheesecake over there. Skip on over and check it out.

If you're visiting from Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky!  welcome. I hope you stay and peek around. If this is your first time here let me point you to a few of my favorite posts.

• Circus Birthday Invite AKA the time I made my husband dress up like a tiger and my niece played the cat tamer
• Eclair Cake, super impressive looking, but totally easy and delicious dessert that grown ups and kiddos will both enjoy
• The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, pictures and review of my trip to Universal Studios Orlando new Potter themed amusement part.

UPDATE: recipe reposted below

Caramel Macadamia Nut Cheesecake Recipe

For the Crust
 1 1/2 (about 1.5 C) packs of graham crackers (crushed)
1/3 C Margarine (melted)
1 TBS Chopped Macadamia nuts

For Cheesecake
3-8 oz pkgs Cream Cheese (room temp)
1 can Sweetened Condensed Milk
1/2 C Sugar
3 Eggs
3 Tbls Lemon Juice
1 Tbl Vanilla
1/4 C Sugar
1 TBS Chopped Macadamia nuts

For Topping
1/2 C. Caramel sauce
1-2 TBS Chopped Macadamia nuts

The Steps

• If you want it to be good you MUST wait for the cream cheese and eggs to come to room temp. don't bother using light or fake cream cheese unless you have high quality artisan cream cheese use Philadelphia cream cheese the taste is worth the extra fat, cost, and time
• Break up the graham crackers (I like to stick them in a ziplock and mush).
• Melt the butter and mix with the graham cracker crumbs. Press them into a springform pan. 
• Sprinkle crust nuts evenly
• Beat the cream cheese and sweetened condensed milk until smooth.
• Add sugar, vanilla, and lemon juice until well combined.
• Add eggs one by one until combined. Mix as little as possible on this step, you just want the eggs fully incorporated.
• Pour half the mixture into the pan on top of the crust sprinkle nuts and top with remaining mixture.
• Bake in at 300F with steam for 1 hour and 15 minutes (until outside is set but inside is still jiggly). Heat a dish while preheating the oven and pour hot water in the dish when you stick the cheesecake in.
• Let cool in the oven with door closed for at least 2 hours 
• Refrigerate for at least 4 hours I think overnight is best, the texture and taste are much better when it's colder 
• Right before serving top with caramel and macadamia nuts.
• Cut with a knife rinsed with hot water between each slice

Take it to a party, have everyone ooh and ahh and make new friends. Let me know if you try it out! If you catch the cheesecake bug check out my blog for other recipes including a copycat recipe of Cheesecake Factory's Wild Blueberry White Chocolate Cheesecake.

Customer Appreciation Pic: Loving the Color

I'm drooling over this awesome picture from Casey of Chasing Lilies Photography that she caught of a little one wearing one of my garden lover bottoms. How stunning are the colors. So gorgeous. As always if you have any pictures of your little ones in my gear I love seeing them!

Check out more of Casey's photography here.

What's for Dinner: Week 75

For those of you are new  to my blog I write these weekly plans to help me spend less (I kinda of love grocery shopping, yea I know I'm weird), to save time and to try and help us eat in more often. Also I love knowing what other people eat so I thought it would be fun to share. For a while I'll be adding my plans for what greens. I'll be eating since one of my resolutions is to build a habit of introducing more green veggies into our diet. Maybe some day it'll be so normal for us that I won't have to mention them any more.

I haven't gotten around to making more pasta. While fresh pasta is absolutely delicious and probably 300% better than good quality pasta from a box, beware, if you start the habit it can be hard to shake. I just can't get myself to eat packaged noodle pasta now. Oh well hopefully my mom and I will crank out a big batch today.

Day	Main Meal	Goals (Veggies, Whole Grain, Fish)
Sunday	Pizza and salad	Grains and nuts: Sandwich, granola bars, ww pasta Veggies: salad, asparagus Fish: oops we'll see
Monday	Chicken Alfredo with asparagus
Tuesday	Cream of Mushroom Soup
Wednesday	Pub Quiz
Thursday	Chicken tortellini with Spinach and blue cheese sauce
Friday	Beef Stroganoff with peas
Saturday	Murder Mystery Dinner

Treasury Love: Orange and Purple

I love it when people let me know they've used one of my items in their Etsy treasuries. Even better when I click to see a collection that just blows me away. Orange and purple is such an unusual color combo it immediate grabbed me. Thanks loads to cremerdani for featuring my Fancy Nancy dress in this lovely treasury. Click here to see all the items up close.

Fitness Journal: Week 27

It was my first time back to swim class in over a month. It was so nice. And as much as I've felt flat out tired from the time change it's been so nice to go to training with the sun still out and shinning. Oh I did 3 pull ups not in a row but 3 one time each, my back/abs weirdness still isn't gone so I couldn't properly try 2 in a row. I'm up half a pound, I didn't eat the best but I don't think I ate that much. Oh well my energy level was kinda weird this week so maybe it's hormonal too.
 
Weight:
3/10/2011 145
3/11/2011145.5
I'm 5'5 but have a small frame
(I think I'm going for 135 and we'll see from there)


Nutrition Breakdown:

daily calorie average: 1536 based on 6 days but I think the incomplete day was a pretty high day

Exercise:
H: Strength Training
F: Bike 40 min
S: none
S: Day off
M: Swim class
T: Strength Training
W: Bike 35 min 5 mi Walk 25 min


Linking up at

Life: While we wait

I've been meaning to share a full cruise review and the yummy places we ate while we were in Orlando on our vacation but being sick for so long when we got back has me with a stinking huge pile of sewing and very little time for photo editing.

I think I'm making my way through the pile but since it seems like people are being tricked into believing that Spring is actually upon us (as opposed to the fact that it's still supposed to snow tomorrow), my shop has been bustleling, I think I should push through as fast as I can. So we'll just have to wait a little longer and enjoy this one shot. It was THAT beautiful, I didn't edit this picture one smidgen.

Show and Tell: Birthday Outfit and Invite Photo Shoot

Sometimes I thinking my little nieces are going to be shocked the day they realize that not all little girls have an aunty that whips up crazy dresses, outfits and parties for every special occasion. But mine do and I love doing it!

T's birthday is coming up in a couple weeks so we needed to get the invite pictures taken asap. What did this entail, oh of course me creating the perfect outfit and theme for the party of course. This year it's all about butterflies, T's choice. And as a bonus, everything we're making for the party is going to end up in the girls' bedroom which I have yet to decorate, no it's not in my house but I kinda love doing this stuff and my sister lets me.

After a frenzy of sewing the dress and crown and making the wand, all of which I am thrilled at how they turned out we had to take the pictures. And I'd say T was only about 40% cooperative and Uncle maybe only 35%.  

You know wouldn't stand where I wanted, wouldn't look at me, wanted to be done or had the most unattractive facial expressions.

Come on it wasn't that cold, L was running around in just a shirt and undies. Wimp! As a side note, I really like how the crown and sleeves turned out. I'm hoping to have a pattern and tutorial for each of those up eventually.

Look at me!!!!!

Luckily I think I found one I can make work. Oh are you wondering why my lovely husband is in one of these pictures umm wearing a headband with a pipe cleaner attached to it? Well if you remember L's circus birthday invite it may give you a clue. Let's just say photoshop here I come and it's going to be awesome. Hopefully I'll have the invite done in the next few days, check back to see the damage.

entering