Party Done, Let the packing beging

Well glad to have that big day behind me. Party was lots of fun, good times with great people and yummy food.
But I have to say it seemed like a whirlwind and hard to believe I even had one. I think when you host a party it is so hard to enjoy it as opposed to being a guest. I really wanted to talk with everyone and was able to spend more time with some than others but hopefully my guests all had a good time. Here are just a few picts from the day.

Now that my part is overwith I have to get crackin on some packin. My mother's gift to me was a trip to Europe. So her and I will be flying out this Thursday for a 2 week vacation to London, UK and Paris, France. I am pretty excited and have to say it hadn't completely sunk in until the party was done and over with.

I let guest look through my scrapbook from my childhood.

 Hubby cooking the ribs..they were delish!

Here I am with my youngest son. He was a HUGE help. So sweet and this guy gave me a gift certificate to a 1-1/2 hour massage..I am beyond floored.

Here I am with my bff. 

This was my bff's son getting ready to smack that Pinata.

And here I am with my dh.

Table Decorations

I thought having some pink flowers would be a nice touch for the table tops. Given that we have picnic tables and using paper coverings in pink and black. I really wanted black buckets but couldn't find them and even though I know I could paint them I figured they were good enough. Just running out of time to get everything done and organized so it will just have to do.

I also made some double sided picks to go into each of the flowers to jazz them up a bit and if I have time I would like to put a label on the outside of the buckets but not sure I will be able to.

Shirts for the 50th Party

Finally got all these shirts done for the party. 9 total I had to make. The girls all get grey tee shirts with pink lettering and the guys get black with white lettering. I originally wanted pink shirts for the girls but for the life of me could not find the right color pink so opted for these grey ones. The guys originally were to have pink lettering and the girls to have black but once my dh heard that he would have no part of it..yup that's my man anti-pink.

Each shirt lets my guests know who they are in relation to me along with some quip. I didn't want to take shots of all the shirts so here's just a sampling so you can see what they look like. Just plain and simple but to the point.

It's hard to read my hubby's byline but it says and (sigh) yes she's spoiled.  That spoiled line gets worked a lot on the other shirts according to who is wearing them. Like my mother's says's I never spoiled her, etc. Playing off on the fact that there is always somebody in your family of siblings that the others claim were spoiled. For me I am the youngest and the only girl so you know my two brothers are going to claim it even if I never saw it that way ;-)

I am cheap frugal and didn't want to pay for all the Silhouette rhinestone paper, setter, etc so I just made a template (made the holes one size larger than size of the stones), set it on my shirt, filled it with the iron on rhinestones, put a cloth over that and ironed on the jewels, pretty easy and didn't need any fancy schmancy stuff! Although if I was to work with rhinestones a lot I would probably make that investment, just for this one little project eh I figured I really didn't need it.

Party Games

Thought I would share the games that will be available to play at the party. Basically whenever you have a bunch of {ahem} older type people there is always a risk of injury and/or lack of participation with physical games, but I figured some harmless mind games would be easy enough, especially since most people would have grown up during my era.

I then came up with three games that wouldn't take too much interaction because when you have a large group of people it can be difficult to manage getting everyone to play and running a game in itself can be a challenge so we decided to just let them fill out a form at their leisure and whoever gets the most answers right, wins.

I then had to decorate the boxes with the black and pink theme so taking ordinary shoe boxes I gave each one a little bit of a different design.

And a huge thank you goes to my youngest son for designing, printing and cutting the forms. He also designed the displays that go with each game, he just hasn't printed them out so I can take a picture of them.

So first up we have Name that Tune. Instead of listening to various tunes and getting people to guess what they are we took the top 10 from the day and asked that they guess what order they go in.

Next up is the Price is Right where they have to guess how much each item costs. I plan on putting out the items with tent cards describing the item and giving today's current price to help give a measure of what things cost today.

And lastly we have In the Year of 1963. This is fairly easy. They only need answer questions about events that occurred in 1963 or questions that reference since 1963.

I hope these go over well and luckily I have my youngest son who is quite the motivator to get people to participate. We also have horse shoes and hoola hoops for those who dare to give it a try.

Disney Themed Magnet Arrows

So sorry I have been MIA all last week but work had me working overtime then I had a horrific migraine that just didn't put me back to my old self until Friday. Then I had a play day. I had been itching to make these for some time now and I admit while they're not the best looking they were easy to make and fun.

My only regret is some washi tape seems to be more translucent than the others so when I had to overlap at times it worked for me and at times it didn't.

First off I want you to know I didn't even think of this great idea I merely copied it and put my own spin on it. The credit goes to How About an Orange Blog from there I just thought these would be cute wrapped in some washi tape. I imagine if you just wanted to cut some arrow shapes from chipboard and then wrap with washi that would work pretty well but then where would be the fun in that without making some origami.

I will say I did try this with various thickness of paper and the best was the plain ol computer paper because of the folds you need to make I had the most success with this paper. I also tried the inserts that come with an album when you buy it as well as some thicker plain white cardstock but not heavy duty . The computer paper does make a more light weight arrow and tends to be more flexible although the washi tape does add some firmness to it. I also found running one piece of tape from tip to end of arrow add the most stability or firmness to the overall feel to the arrow. Then you can either continue wrapping in that manner or wrap the body of arrow width wise and I aligned the ends of the tap with the base of the arrowhead and folded over the top, cutting at times when it needed it.

The squares of the arrow were 2.5 inch and 3 inch but you could go up or down a half inch for more sizes or go really large but I wouldn't advise going too small because it's harder to manipulate the folds.

So the instructions are on the How About an Orange blog and after you make the arrows you can wrap in washi and hot glue on a magnet or get some self adhesive magnets. I wrapped mine with Queen and Co Disney themed tape as my daughter's kitchen is Disney themed and she actually has a big ol white board where she writes out chores and daily to do tasks on it. So these should fit in quite well.

Updated Silverware Holders

So it's nearing my party date and I have lots to show you but all in due time. I idid want to go ahead and show you these holders. If you remember this was my first rough draft and I wasn't that impressed and had some great suggestions. So after a revamp this is what my final product is. I would love to do pink silverware, but I had already purchased a huge case at Costco from my grandson's birthday so I felt the need to use what I had on hand. I was going to make circle tags but decided to attach 40 tags would be too tedious so I just opted to adhere the circles to the silverware holder as opposed to hanging them from the ribbon with safety pins.

KK Birthday Card

So this is another card I had started at the expo and just now got around to finishing it. I suddenly have a need for more birthday cards especially since my mom has discovered my secret stash. My stack is much shorter than I am used to having on hand and therefore need to replenish what I used to have plus make a few extra for her. I really don't mind, I am just glad she likes them enough to send them to her friends.

Kind of liking that purple, lime green and orange color theme.

Smore Cupcake

It's no secret that I love s'mores..pretty much s'more anything...but have to say these cupcakes really have a tender spot with me because it's two great loves coming together, cake and s'mores..mmmmm

So I have been hankering to make these for awhile and finally had the opportunity so as soon as my oven was preheated I whipped up a batch and thoroughly devoured enjoyed eating this scrum-dily-ious tasty treat. So now you too can bake some of these yummy treats and share with your family..or not (tee hee hee) I won't tell.

S'more Cake (makes 1 dozen or 12 cupcakes)

1-1/2 C Graham Cracker crumbs (about 15 whole crackers ground in processor)
1/2 C All-purpose flour
2-1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 C (1 stick) unsalted, room temp butter
3/4 C Sugar
2 Large Eggs (room temp is best)
1 tsp Vanilla
3/4 C Milk (room temp is best)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

Whisk graham cracker crumbs, flour, baking powder, and pinch of salt in medium bowl
Beat butter with sugar in large mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Add eggs 1 at a time and beat 3 minutes to fully incorporate. Beat in vanilla. Add graham cracker mixture in 3 additions alternating with milk in 2 additions, beginning and ending with dry ingredients.

Divide batter among lined muffin cups and bake 18-20 min until toothpick comes out clean
Let cool on a rack as soon as they are cool make the ganache

Chocolate Ganache

8 oz bittersweet chocolate (not to exceed 61% cacao)
1/2 C whipping cream

Place chocolate in a medium bowl. Bring cream just to a boil in a small saucepan (or the microwave). Pour the hot cream over the chocolate and let stand 1 minute. Stir/whisk until smooth. Cool ganache until it's a thick consistency enough to spread on cupcakes.

Spread ganache onto cupcakes (or feel free to dip) allow to cool until ganache is firm (can also chill in fridge for 5-10 min), now they are ready to frost.

Marshmallow Frosting

4 Large Egg whites
1 C Sugar
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
1 tsp Vanilla extract

Place egg whites, sugar and cream of tartar in a mixing bowl of an electric mixer and set it over a pot filled with simmering water. Whisk consistently until sugar is dissolved and whites are warm to the touch (3-4 minutes)
Transfer the bowl to electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment and beat starting on low speed gradually increasing speed to high until the mixture is stiff and glossy peaks form (5-7 minutes). Add vanilla and mix until well combined.

Pipe the frosting on the cupcakes and using a blow torch toast the marshmallow frosting until brown. If you don't have a blow torch you can also place under the broiler in your oven but be careful not to cause the frosting or the ganache to melt, so be sure your broiler is pre-heated and set to high then it should just take a few seconds (30-60 seconds)

Two Years Old

So today I am sharing a layout of my middle grandbaby who at the time of the picture had just turned 2 years old. He is a fiesty thing and still at that age where he is learning to express himself and hasn't master the art of the english language but despite those moments of angry frustrations he can still be as cute and as sweet as any two year old can be.

I have a mix of pp from Stampin Up as well as Papertrey Ink. The scallop rectangle was cut out using the Cameo and the letters are from various Thickers which I purchased throught the years.

Radiant Pearls

I am not sure if anyone uses these anymore since Copics became a huge mechanism for coloring stamps, but I wanted to share with you these oldie but goody products. If you are not familiar with them they come in little pots much like Twinkling H20s but are liquid so you can paint with them or mix them with other mixed media which seems to be on the upswing again.

The thing I like best about Radiant Pearls is they are very shimmery and vivid in color. I heat emboss my images and then just happily paint along. The raised embossed edge keeps the pearls from spilling over. I used the Radiant Pearls to color the surfboards, the sun was also heat embossed and the sand was created using some of the love Magic sand from about 15 years ago. I also used alcohol ink on a piece of acetate to create the wave back ground

Old Soul

So here we have a page dedicated to my youngest dgs habit of sucking and chewing on his bottom lip. When he does this it just ups the old man look factor. He is such a joy, always smiling, always happy to see you so of course I had to capture this cute look.