Springtime wreath

How cute is this? I made it out of lunch sacks! Seriously! I found the idea on THIS blog. She added butterflies to hers which I thought was cute but didn't really go with my decor and I'm a simple kind of girl so I just left it plain with a pretty ribbon. Who knew that lunch sacks could look so nice?

Speaking of using unconventional items to craft with..... I'm teaching a "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" class at the A Muse shop on Saturday, April 18th. I always love it when I can re-purpose something into something useful and cute. Don't worry, I'm not going to make you weave a sweater out of your dryer lint or anything! Please call the A Muse shop or visit their website to register. I promise it will be fun!

Spring Fever & New Class Schedule

I've got Spring Fever, how about you? The sunshine is really putting me in the mood to be outside although it's still a little chilly! Perfect stamping weather....in fact, I'm teaching a Spring Fever class this weekend at the A Muse Shop! Here's one of the cards we'll be making


My new class schedule has just been posted too so check out my sidebar or stop by the A Muse shop to see the fun new classes for the next quarter.

Party Themes

I'm a theme kind of girl. I love to find a theme and then plan an event around it. It's so fun (and sometimes challenging) to find things that work with the theme and pull it all together.

For Sam's 10th birthday I had the perfect theme in mind. We planned to give him Rockband 2 as a gift so I could work the theme around that. I had the cute stamps picked out for the invites and thank-you's. Visions of "rock star", "party like a rockstar" and "you rock" from A Muse were dancing in my head and figured I could title the invite "Come jam with Sam". I envisioned all the cute band photos I could get of these boys ............it was all coming together............until Nintendo threw a wrench in my wheel. I could not find Rockband 2 for the Wii ANYWHERE! It's been out of stock since before Christmas. Now what? Time was ticking.......I didn't have a theme!

Finally Sam said to me "mom, we just want to play video games and eat pizza. Maybe I could have a couple friends sleepover?". Really? How was I supposed to make a theme out of that?

So I looked through my stamps and found the "party flags" stamp which is perfect for any party and then I remembered I had this game controller stamp from Lizzy Anne. Easy, simple, PERFECT!
I found these cute candy dispensers that look like a Wii remotes (they shoot out Smarties candy) and puzzle erasers shaped like pizza. I threw in some bubble gum pieces and I had perfectly themed treat bags!

Sam requested rootbeer floats instead of cake but it's hard to put a candle in a float so we made some fun candy sushi (my boy LOVES sushi). I saw the idea online for making sushi rolls using Twinkies but we decided to use crispy rice treats for the rice and went a step further making regular sushi with Swedish Fish. How fun is this?




























Okay, so maybe the sushi didn't quite go with the rest of the theme......unless the theme is "all things Sam loves". (so I put some sushi puzzle erasers in some of the bags to tie it in ) You can tell by the smile on his face that he had fun!

Happy Birthday, Sam!

Hoo Hoo Loves You?

My niece, Zoe, is about the cutest thing ever. Since she was born the kids and I have decided that her signature animal should be an owl since she's got big expressive eyes and she's super smart. Every holiday we give her something with an owl on it and it cracks me up because she calls them "hoo hoo's" (I almost wet my pants the first time she asked for her hoo hoo blanket!).

This is Zoe's valentine card. I cut out the A Muse papers using the Paisley cartridge on my Cricut. I just love the mixture of colors and patterns and plan to play around with this image some more. I used some black pearls on her eyes and they were the perfect touch!!

Snowman Soup

Did you think we'd never come back? We had an amazingly wonderful (and a bit exhausting) trip. Kayla came home with 2 gold and a bronze medals, lots of experiences and some new friends! We also came home to an extreme temperature change (18 degrees at home vs mid 90's in Brazil) and hit the ground running into the holidays!

I didn't get much craftiness in but I did manage to a make a couple dozen of these little snowman soups for some teachers and friends. The cute little cup is a Coluzzle template that I've had for quite some time and I don't know if you can even find it anymore (sorry). It was a bit labor intensive cutting each one out but so perfect, don't you think? I sure wish there was a die cut for a cup like this though. If anyone knows of one, please let me know because it's perfect for all sorts of things. This template is actually a box but I left the top off so I could fill it with bigger things. The snowman soup poem is from a make-n-take at the A Muse Shop last year.

We've had some cold temperatures here in the Pacific Northwest but so far, no snow to speak of.
I hope you all enjoyed your holidays and wish you all the best for the coming New Year!

Amazing Awaits........

That's the motto of the US Paralympic team and pretty much sums up how we're feeling right now. Tomorrow morning we'll fly to Washington DC to meet the rest of the US Paralympic team and staff and then fly to Rio de Janeiro to compete in the Short Course World Championships. 264 athletes from 31 countries and my baby girl is one of them!!! This picture was taken 2 years ago when she first qualified to swim in a Paralympic sanctioned meet. She was SO proud to pose in front of the sign! Now she's a member of this special team representing our country! To say I am proud is an understatement!

Please keep us in good thoughts and we travel to South America to attend this competition.

Amazing Awaits!

Look Mom, no braces!

Kayla got her braces off today! She's had them on less than a year and a half so we were amazed when Dr. Sullivan said she was done! We did some early intervention with palate expanders which really made a difference in the length of time she had to wear them.

Here she is in the orthodontist's office before:



and after:


She had a caramel apple tonight and tomorrow we are having corn on the cob! She's really looking forward to the gooey Halloween candy. Hmmm.......maybe I should've made the appointment AFTER Halloween!