Cupcake Apparitions

Jeremy signed me up to make cupcakes for his class this year and this is what we came up with.

I saw the idea for the ghosts on the internet using just gumdrops but that makes one tiny ghost even with the jumbo drops so in a stroke of genius (and a massive sugar high) I unwrapped a bunch of dum dums I bought for the trick or treaters and came up with this instead.

I’m so proud of myself. I used a #3 piping tip from Wilton to punch out the eyes in some marshmallow fondant cut with a cookie cutter the size of a wide mouth mason jar ring and draped it over. It doesn’t get any easier (or cuter) than that. Took me an hour to decorate 25 and that’s because I’m cake challenged, it probably doesn’t take anyone else half as long. Plenty of time left before Halloween to make at least 500 if you want to give it a whirl ;).

Costumes are done. DONE. I’ll show off some more tomorrow!

School Pictures Stink.

No surprise here but I got our school pictures back and heaven help me. My mom came this weekend and saw them and gave me that look. I know what she’s thinking. She’s hoping I give her wallets so she doesn’t have to display them ;).

Jeremy actually takes pretty normal pictures as far as his body goes but his expression is not my favorite. He likes the “drunk, dazed, and confused smiling chicken” expression. I think you have to have a chicken to know the look. They cock their heads kind of sideways and give you a blank stare. If chickens could smile they would look like this-

When anyone but myself takes Ashlyn’s picture she gets really shy and ducks, losing her neck completely. She looks like one of the Barbies we had growing up that no one played with because her neck was broken so we crammed her head on the neck stem anyway. Every school picture reminds me of neck less Malibu Barbie. Her skin is pretty tricky since she’s so porcelain toned and it almost always comes out green on film. Don’t even get me started on her expression. What is this?

Lifetouch says “looks you’ll love”- uh huh. Every year. So, because these are staying hidden in the kid’s baby books for all time and eternity I decided to take it upon myself to capture my criminal’s mug shots as I see them. I had to grab each kid at a different time of day so the coloring is a bit different for each of them. I’m no photographer (obviously) and I don’t claim to be but I think these are just a tiny bit better than Chicken Jim and Malibu Ash.

So mom, you’re welcome. I’m such a nice daughter I won’t make you hang the blue ones on your wall until you’re 90 ;). I took a picture of all of the kids so I could send updated photos to everyone.

I’m off to stop procrastinating and *start* sewing the costumes I need to make. I’m so glad I’m only making 2!

The making of a monarch

Just your average Tuesday afternoon.

With the worlds biggest freezer paper stencil and free hand sketching. And a very large salad bowl. And carpal tunnel syndrome.

And lots and lots of paint.

And a bit of patience.

All for Ashlyn who doesn’t want to be just a butterfly. Not a butterfly fairy with wings either. She wants to be “you know, that black and orange butterfly. With spots.”. Yeah, I know- sigh.

She’s such a bad influence, that Ashlyn. I had Mary convinced she wanted a hot pink tutu and wings for her butterfly costume and that’s all. But now she wants to be a pink moth since Ashlyn is a monarch. A moth? A moth- fine. Sigh.

Next year they are all going to be rocks. I mean it!

Pretty Please!

I have a little bit of a favor to ask, just an teensy one that should take only a few seconds to do.  I love getting comments and I love it even more when you ask me a question, and I love answering them.  The problem is sometimes those questions need to be answered one on one and when I go to reply some of you have your profiles set to “no reply”.  I want to answer, I want to talk to you but I can’t.

So you need to open a new window and login to your blogger account (even if you don't have a blog, you have an account in order to comment). On the left hand side of your Dashboard page you should see-

Click on "Edit Profile."
(Not so bad, see?)
Now it will take you to a page that looks like this-

Now scroll to "Show my email address" and check the box.  Hit save at the bottom. That's it.  Done!  Pretty painless.  Now when you leave a comment it gets sent to my email and I can reply directly to you from my email.  Your email won’t show up for everyone to see in my comments, it will only show up to those people you leave the comment for.

If you aren’t comfortable clicking the box that’s okay to, just send your questions to dontlickthefloor@hotmail.com and I’ll answer you there if you’d rather.  I’ve had a bunch of questions lately that for one reason or another I can’t do an entire post on and I really want to answer (really I do!).

I’m working on Halloween costumes today. I’m up to my eyeballs in wings and tulle.  Have a great Monday! 

Cottage Prequel

I’m not feeling very “wordy” tonight.  I just need my lasagna to hurry up and finish baking so I can go curl up and shrivel away on the couch.  I’m feeling shrively.  With a need for chocolate and ice cream.  I don’t have ice cream so I’ll have to wing it and eat my weight in other things to try and pacify the craving.  Awh, it’s good to be a hormone ridden girl. 

So without further ado and barely any explaining here are the pictures I should have posted yesterday but just got my camera back today-

I can’t take a picture of the peg people in their home with the littles awake so that’s going to have to wait.  I don’t want them to see my hiding spot ;).

This one’s for the family and anyone else that loves to see my cute son. Jeremy finished his football season last night, undefeated I might add.  Doesn’t he look grown up in his uniform. A bunch of mini men running around on a really big field.  I love it, and the boy under all that padding!

Off to shrivel and find some chocolate pudding.  I think I have some of that…

Miss Locks

I’ve been singing “O Holy Night” all week so you can guess what’s on my mind. It’s really hard to work on Christmas gifts when the girls are awake and I go to bed by 10 every night to read so not much is happening yet in the toy making department. I’m making slow progress in between curtain sewing bursts but I did manage to paint up a few peg people and an adorable little house bag for them to live in last week. Yep, I’ve had this project marinating for over a week now and I haven’t been able to blog about it since my camera has been going to work with Cody (ugghh). So you get this-

A cruddy cell phone picture taken in the dark. I can’t wait another minute to share. Patience has never been one of my virtues. This is the Bear Family and their rude little blond house guest for Kaci. The little cottage bag has a see through window in front. I plan on making a doll house for her (I already have it) but the bag should come in handy for those times when Kaci just needs to bring them places. I’m also working on a vet set for Mary so I’ll take a real picture of the entire thing when I’m done. With a real camera even ;).

The queen of this castle is getting her first crown (dental) tomorrow and I’m a little nervous about the whole thing. I like my teeth ordinary. Wish me luck!

For the love of free fonts!

I’m not sure if I’ve shared this before or not but I am a complete font junky. I collect them and have tons of them. You’ll never see me collecting purses, shoes, or beanie babies but show me a font site and I’m taken. I only use a handful at any given time but if I ever need dancing Cinderella on an A (why??) or a random doodle I have it. I’m a fontaholic and I am not seeking treatment. So as I was reading Hannah from Sherbet Blossom today she shared a link that I think is amazingly cool- www.fontcapture.com . You can make a free font from your handwriting. Free! I’ve wanted to do this for a long time but was to cheap to pay out for my own chicken scratch. Now I can type my free scratch all I want. Like this-

I also tortured the girls and made them write one. I can’t wait for Jeremy to come home (rubbing hands together and laughing an evil evil laugh here).

Have a great Monday!

A few things in my little world…

That make me happy.

*Whirly giggles.  Doesn’t the name just make you want to smile.  When I’m done, and I’m just starting, this block will be part of a twin sized quilt for Jeremy.  I’m going to quilt, gulp, again.  I think.

 

*Playing with my versa tool and getting a pretty tea towel out of it. I tried heat transfer images from a laser copy and all in all I think it looks pretty darn good.  I only burned myself once!  I’m told the image is permanent and won’t fade with washing more than it already looks- we shall see.

 

*Giving Mary a camera and letting her snap pictures at will.  I have a ton of pictures of my tv screen and Kennedy’s eye balls but every once in a while I get surprised with something like this-

  Not too bad for a 5 year old with a point and shoot.

 

*Too cute dresses made from my tutorials, Ashlee sent me an email sharing hers and I asked her if I could show this on here because hello- in love with the pom pom trim and adorable model. There’s still time to make some halloween dresses so chop chop people, get sewing!  She made a couple of them so go check her out.

*The conclusion of the ring saga. I’m so glad it’s back and since some of you asked where I found it here goes. Grab some popcorn and settle in for the mystery of the century.  It wasn’t where I left it last at all, not even close, but I think it had help migrating to where it ended up.  I remember leaving it on a shelf above the toilet in the bathroom or on the counter next to the sink that has no drain cover and thought for sure it went down the sewer when I finally remembered it a week later and it was gone.  I’m bright like that.

I got desperate after week 2 of casually looking for it and dug around everywhere and couldn’t find it.  So I gave up and decided to make a c.d. with white fan noise for Kennedy to use at nap time since she’d gotten used to the fan in her room all summer and it was getting too cold to turn it on.  You know, you have something important to do like clean up so you look for any excuse not to do it… that’s what that was.  I should have been unpacking hoping my ring was in a box but alas, I was not. 

I couldn’t find the blank disks we had by the computer so I went upstairs because I remembered seeing a stack of blank c.d.’s or something on the top of my dresser (I have no idea why they were there but I can only blame my roommate who took over my dresser top long ago).  When I picked up the c.d.’s my ring was teetering underneath with a bunch of Cody’s receipts and drill bits.  I know I checked that dresser at least 6 times and Cody did to so it’s a mystery as to how it finally ended up there.  I have my suspicions but since it’s back I’m putting the finger printing kit away ;).   I’ve vowed never to take it off again, after Cody handed it to me last night from the bathroom window sill.  I’m a slow learner.

*Long winded posts that make me feel like I’ve just run 5 miles.

I’m off to finish a few more towels and wash the crud out of them to see if it actually worked.  Have a great whatever day it is today!

Something a little more girly

After Saturdays manly forest fun I haven’t been feeling very “frilly” and it didn’t help that my mom looked at my blog and said she couldn’t tell if the picture I posted was me or Cody. I realize it was a horrible picture and I was stuffed like a camo oven mitt with flaming orange trim but come on… still a girl over here.

To reclaim my femininity I decided to fix a dress I’ve been hanging on to for a few weeks now. I couldn’t wear it because it’s way too short but I thought it had potential so I picked it up. I thought it would be cute as a long tunic with jeans for those “not in the mood to wear a dress but still want to look girly” days so I didn’t want to add length to the dress itself. So I did this instead-

I found a long slip that was a little too big and I never wore, cut some length off of it and added a big ruffle. I ironed the ruffle flat so I wouldn’t look too little house on the prairie and viola`. I love it and I can wear the ruffle slip with other skirts and stuff.

I love my 1974 photo action, makes my darker arms almost match my pasty legs… almost ;).

Have a great Tuesday!

Shhh… be vewy vewy quiet

 

 

I went hunting Saturday.

I had to get up at 4:30 in the morning.  Such an un-holy hour, especially in the pitch black forest when it’s snowing and cold!

It didn’t take very long to realize hunting is nothing (nothing) like the wii game.  Very misleading and I think I might have to write a strongly worded email to the folks at Nintendo.  This was no duck hunt my friends…

It’s a lot of hiking, and woods, and snow, and cold, and dirt, and 20 extra pounds of long john’s (whoo baby, I looked hot!), and no make up.  Not to mention I had to whisper for 4 hours.  Did I mention there’s not a restroom in sight.  The world is your porta potty…

Was I successful?  It depends on how you look at it.  I got a really cool picture of snowflakes on a spider web and I got to spend the middle of the night day with Cody in his element doing something he loves to do.  That’s pretty much all I was hoping to do anyway.  I call it a win.  Until I get dragged out to try again anyway…

I see a very long weekend with sewing and fabric shopping in Cody’s future, the very near future. My thumbs are still frozen solid!  The things I do for the most handsome husband in the whole wide world.

Thank you so much for all your comments about my sad ring story.  I read each one more than once.  You all made me feel so much better, I felt like such a loser.  I can’t believe how depressing it was, but the good news is it’s found!  I’m naked no more!  It’s such a huge relief and I haven’t cried since Wednesday.  I think Cody is happier than I am- we don’t have to buy stock in Kleenex now ;).