Nana's Happy Day Preperation-part 1- "Thing 2" cupcake toppers

Over the weekend my little itty bitty baby girl turned two. Ok, so I guess she really isnt itty bitty any more, but still!

As of late she has been really loving the new show on PBS called 'The Cat In The Hat Knows Alot About That", and loving all of the Dr. Seuss Books we have! So I thought I would take a shot at making her a "Hat" (as she calls it) themed party!

Here is my first project- Thing "2" Cupcake Toppers.One thing I really like to do is really "make" my childrens birthdays. I want my children to have wonderful memories and look back and know that I took my time to make sure that THEIR special day was the best it could be! I start thinking of themes months before, i start google-ing images, and Ideas and brainstorming cakes!

These are completely edible, they are made of Wiltons Melting Chocolate

Here is how I made them.

First you will want to line all of your baking sheets with wax paper and line them up on your counter

Next, get all of your chocolates and your candy decorating bags ready

Next melt your first color in a glass dish ( I use a measuring cup) untill its fully melted and then scoop it into your decorating bag

Squirt your border color in what ever shape you want, I started with squiggly circles, and eventually did some regular ones that resemble the "thing" border from there shirts in the cartoon.

for the center I did number 2's, what ever you put in the center, make sure you do it backwards! I for got a few times!

let that sit for a few min to start to harden and then cover with your center color, and spread it to the edges

Pop them in the freezer for just a few minutes, then flip them over to see your work! They will release very easy from the wax paper.

I was doing the "Seuss" theme, so perfection was not something I needed, which is another reason I LOVED this theme! Imperfection is almost KEY for the character of all of my projects!

Once I was done making all of my toppers, I placed them on layers of wax paper in a plastic container and froze them until the night before the party. Since I made them on Tuesday night it helped insure there survival until Sunday! :)

On Saturday Night I decorated the cake ( a whole other post!) and the cupcakes. I made simple chocolate cupcakes, and i did squiggly blue frosting, to kind of resemble the "things". and then I smushed on a topper!

These were so fun and easy to make, and they were a huge hit at the party!

*some of these photos have low quality because I was too lazy to walk up stairs to get my good camera and used my iPhone instead!

Dresser Re-do for Adams Nursery!

When I had Savanna we lived in a tiny 2 bedroom condo and There was only a tiny loft type space off of my master bedroom for her, so needless to say I didn't get to do the whole baby nursery nesting thing, so this time I was so excited that we had the space and I had the time to create a wonderful space for my little man! This was my first project for his room!

I was on a search for a long short dresser, and a friends mom just happened to have one in her garage that had been shoved in the back for the last 15 years, she said that if my husband could drag it out it was all mine!

I had no idea what it looked like, but I didn't care. I had a vision and I was determined!

And In all my excitement to start sanding, I forgot to take a "before" picture, at the time I was on blogging hiatus! So just imagine a whole dresser that looks like this drawer! :)

And then I sanded, sanded and sanded!

until it was soft and smooth beautiful naked wood!

Then I started Painting it a beautiful blue with red accent!

Dont mind the Nosy little dog, or the pile of laundry on top! This was when I was trying to fill this dresser!

This project Cost an estamated $40, for paint and sanding sheets. Not bad! But now that I have learned a few things about painting furniture my next piece will cost a lot less!

My "crush" and my fear of the beard!

Im not one who "normally" has a celebrity crush. Yes there are actors that are attractive, and I do have a soft spot for Owen Wilson...something about his crooked nose just..but Baseball players on the other hand they are who I normally have my celebrity crushes on. And for the last several years it has been this man....

I LOVE the arm cross he does when he saves the game. I don't know why, I just do. He drives my husband crazy cause of the way he blinks. REALLY? the way he BLINKS? YES! I would have never noticed it, but of course Steven pointed it out to me. So I did the same in return to him about the girl from NCIS LA.  lol!

So for the last few years I have loved this baseball eye candy, I even started to REALLY like to watch the ends of the games....but the BEARD? I think its gotten out of hand, Im all for a little manly scruff...but a full on bushel of a beard....No good!

Dear Brian Wilson,
I happen to think you are delicious but I fear the BEARD is making you less attractive, and the just for men hair dye that you use on it is NOT helping. but I respect the superstitions of baseball.
Please also stop giving my husband a heart attack in the ninth inning when you decide to load the bases. Just please do your job, 15 pitches max would be good!
Sincerly
Moe

Frugal home decorating - Halloween edition

I love decorating my home, it is one of my favorite things to do. But as we all know all the looks we see in the PB catalog are usulally out of our budget, So Im always striving to make my home look as good as I can with out breaking the bank. As many of you know 'dollar store decorating' is all the rage right now in blog land. I have been inspired by so many wonderful Ideas, I hope to start Linking my crafts to there wonderful blogs as well!

Here is My first official "Frugal" attempt at decorating. Just so happens it was just in time to play host to some Halloween Decorations.

I was in the dollar store on the look out for some vases and candlesticks to make into some apothocary type decorations for my guest bathroom. I lucked out and found two cute hurricane type vases along with candlesticks. I also grabbed a few cheap halloween decorations while I was there!

I went home and started my project right away,

I used gorilla glue super glue, It worked great and dried clear! After letting it dry for several hours upside down they were ready to get filled up with goodies!

I spray painted some florists foam to use to fill up some of the space in the jars, wrapped it with some orange fabric that I had on hand and placed the skulls and a Giant spider inside the jars!

and here are some of the rest of my Halloween decorations! my personal fave is the rug in front of the toilet! With having the fabric, spray paint and glue on hand the rest of the materials cost me only $5, and the vases will be great for every season/holiday!

DON'T STOP BELIEVING!

'Round these here parts we eat sleep and breath Giants baseball, every season, all season no matter where they are in the standings!

WERE GAMERS!

You have to watch this video even if your not a giants fan, cause this is just an awesome video!

In ♥ LOVE ♥ with Lightroom

Im finally spending some time tinkering around with Adobe Lightroom. I must say that I am IN LOVE! The things that it can do to my photography is amazing. 

I love photography, and I normall love the pictures that I take, but oh how I love them more now that I know a thing or two about editing!

here is just a taste of a sweet Miss Nan, from easter of 2009. 

This is the "after" 

 

Here is the "before"

In my own humble opinion words cannot describe how amazing this photo turned out to be! I will definitly ordering a LARGE one for my photo wall that I am currently working on.

Reward Sites

Do you use 'reward sites'?

About 3 months ago I started usuing a site called SWAGBUCKS . It is a basic search engine just like Google, Yahoo, and Bing. The best thing about this site is that you randomly earn 'SWAGBUCKS' that you can collect and redeem towards fun stuff, gift cards, pay pall dollars, or my personal favorite Amazon.com gift cards.

If you are interested in signing up for this it is SUPER easy! Please just follow THIS LINK and sign up, not only will I get point for this, but I will HELP you get points as well. Its fun, easy and FREE!

So far in the 3 months that I have been using this as my home page Ive earned $30 in Amazon gift cards, that totally free money, doing nothing that I dont already do! I figure I search SOMETHING online at least 5-10 times a day, might as well get something out of it. Im saving it up to use around xmas time! In times like these every extra dollar really counts!

Tackle It Tuesday....Garage Addition!

I feel like its been years since I was able to park in my garage. Maybe that is because it has been! Well, atleast a year I would say. Frist when we moved in there was all the 'extra' stuff that I hadnt found a home for, then we cleaned out my husbands great grandmothers house and moved a ton of it to our garage, then we cleaned out my great grandparents house...you see the pattern? This is what it has pretty much looked like since we moved in

Ok, so maybe this was in the midst of a cleaning and perging session in preperation for a garage sale, but it has definitly been very messy all along!

We did get rid of the camping trailer a few months ago.....and replaced it with an aluminum fishing boat (UGH) but the garage has still been in disarray. 

And one thing I have to admit is that this tackle was not preformed by me, but by my AWESOME husband. He occasionally gets into a cleaning "mode" and there is no stopping him. I think our recent facination with the show 'Hoarders' may have had a little bit to do with it, that, and the fact that I have been nagging about wanting to be able to park my car in the garage with winter time coming and having two small children.

I am beyond PLEASED to show off my garage, which not only can I park in, but there is room also to put the boat in!

I am so very excited to have a clean garage, not only can I park in it, but I know have the space to finish several large projects that I started months and months ago, plus the other 100 that I have on my "to do" list! 


*sorry for the low quality of the after photos, they were taken by my iphone

Mister Man

On July 28th, after MANY days of feeling like I was in labor I FINALLY got to meet my little man.

This is Adam Richard Jensen- 'round here he is most often called Mister Man, and it will melt your heart when you hear Savanna say it sometihing to the effect of "ISSER MAAAAN"

Im planning a much more in depth post on his actual birth story, but here are just a few shots to get you threw!