Sneak peak

Here's a little peep show for our up coming birthday party at our house. Finding gold Easter eggs online wasn't cheap so I found plastic eggs at my local thrift store and gold spray paint look just as good. Stay tuned to see how we use these little cuties.

Christmas in July

Our annual trip is almost coming to a close. It's been hard to pick our favorite thing so far. But if you ask the kids, it would probably be our Christmas in July night. All the kids re enact the nativity from Luke 2. With only 4 kids this year, we were short a Mary, but nana stepped in to fill the roll. We then have a gift exchange. The adults do a nice white elephant gift exchange. The kids buy a gift for another cousin and nana and papa give a gift too. But this year, we had a special guest. Santa arrived to give a small gift to each child and it was so fun to see the look in their eyes. Truly the magic of believing. My 7 year old couldn't decide who he was and kept going back and forth. But finally came to the conclusion that he must have been the real thing.

Pumpkins in June?

We compost around here and so when my husband planted our grapes during early spring we used compost. When things started heating up we found that we were going to have some sort of squash. So we retransplanted them and nourished them. Imagine my surprise when I found a pumpkin! I've tried to grow pumpkins in Phoenix for years now and the year I don't try I actually get one. How fun. To bad it came up in June instead of October!

Patio Furniture Redo

I've had this cute cafe set for about 5 years now. It was in my grandmother's condo and after she passed away it came to live at my house. Our hot Arizona sun and heat has taken a turn on this cute set and I finally got tired of looking at it. I picked up a can of rust oleum hammered spray paint in brown and sprayed away. Please excuse the dusty mess. We had a haboob (a fancy word for a dust storm) go through and it's made everything a mess. I'm loving the change. Just one small step to get my backyard ready for the fall when we can actually use it again without dying of heat.

Lego Birthday Party

We took the summer off around here.  Too much happening all at once.  One thing we did was have a Lego Birthday Party for my 6 year old.  We invited 6 friends.  Wish I had an invite to show, but forgot to take a picture.  But they did look like lego bricks, rectangular with cirlces punched out on top and LEGO stamped on each circle.

We built an entire lego city from Legos that my brothers and I played with as kids.  Because we had 7 little boys we didn't want the city too big.  It was easier to move around.  We had a beach, police station, airport, horse ranch, 2 houses and a dock.  We had all of our loose legos off to the side so they could build cars and other creations.

We played "Stamp the face on the Lego Guy".  Each boy was given a different face.  They copied their face onto a 6" yellow circle with markers.  This was fun as each face was totally different.  We then blind folded them and had them stamp the lego guy's face on.  We removed each face after each turn.  The boys laughed so hard to see their faces end up somewhere other than the yellow part.

I made the lego guy out of card stock and found a lego guy on the internert.  It was then glued onto a full size poster board. I had the lego stickers from a scrapbook store in Poway, California. 

 For the cake we did cupcakes.  I had the Cupcakes made by CalebCream. They are based out of Phoenix, so when they have a sale, I would totally recommend them.  We ordered chocolate with buttercream frosting.  They boys couldn't wait to eat theirs. 

 I had another friend design the cake toppers and they were printed at Wal-Mart to save me time and ink.  I cut them to size, rounded the corners and then glued them on to 2 inch scalloped squares I cut from my cricut.  I then glued a toothpick on the back.  I will say, these cake toppers were a big hit.  All the boys wanted to take theirs home.

I used my glass jars from Hobby Lobby and filled them with loose Lego bricks.  The big lego guy is from Legoland.  I put everything on the green Lego squares

I bought the yellow plates, oranges napkins and blue silverware at Wal-Mart.  I used a sharpie to draw a Lego face on the plates.  I used Juice boxes from Cost-co and used green card-stock and a 1 inch circle punch with foam dots to make them look like a Lego brick.

For the food we did mini rolls, lunch meat, cheese puffs, cheese and lots of fruits and veggies.  I wanted to have colorful food. The cheese puffs were a big hit, but the carrots and celery, not so much.

Finally for the gift bags, I used 8 x 10  size bags I bought at Michaels.  I cut 4 inch circles and adhered them with foam tape.  I used just the yellow, orange and red bags.  I filled them with Lego Club Jr. magazines I was able to pick up for free at the Lego store at our local mall.  I put two of them in there as I went twice and got two different months.  I also put in a solid colored bouncy ball I bought at the Dollar Tree.  I found mini note pads in orange and found mechanical pencils in primary colors also at the Dollar Tree.  I tied them all up with a colorful dot ribbon.  I then found some Legos on clearence after Easter to put into their bags.  I had been planning since before Easter for this Summer birthday party.  I found brick candies at the mall and just put them in a cello bag with a tag that said they were brick candy.  I also made Lego Guy crayons.  I bought my mold at the Lego Store and used all our old  crayons.  I made them solid colors and put them in a bag with a tag around them.  Each bag probably cost around $3.  The bulk of that price was the clearence Legos I bough at $2 a piece.

 

Each boy was so excited to pick their bag.  I used the bags as decorations until it was time to leave. I also found plastic primary colored banners pennets from the Dollar Tree to decorate with.  Over all it was a huge success.  The only thing I was not prepared for was the parents who stayed at the birthday party. 



How does your garden grow?

I didn't think that a year ago that we would have a garden ready in time to plant anything. We didn't for a time, but both husband and I were getting antsy. (Did you know that we are certified master gardeners?) So last fall, we tilled and worked the ground. What a pay off to finally see the results of our labor. This is the second round of broccoli we have had since planting the plants. Love it. Next up, watermelon, tomatoes, herbs, peppers, onions and carrots.

Make Up bag

Yesterday I spent making this cute little bag. I love it, its perfect. I think I want to use it for a small purse. Its completely lined inside, has a zipper, which I'm thinking I need to take a class on how to put in a zipper. But none the less, I love this. I love the fabric, which I found a thrift store. Since I want to use it as a small purse, any ideas of where to find a tutorial on making a cloth wallet?