Battling the Sickies

My poor girls and poor hubby have been pretty miserable these last few days!  We've been battling the icky germs that my eldest brought home.  Lovely runny nose, snot everywhere, lowgrade fever and an annoying cough.  Gotta love it!   The eldest is almost over it, the littlest ones are still suffering from a snotty nose and cough and the poor hubby has lost his voice!  And somehow I have managed to avoid getting sick even though I am usually the one that has their shirt used as a tissue!

An order for 1 large family bubble, please!  Seriously, I hate it when the kids get sick.  No fun for anyone!

But before the lovely germs decided to visit, we had some fun times!  We went to the zoo to trick or treat.  My girl was ecstatic to be able to finally wear her costume!  Here is the back:

Whatcha think of the tail and wings?

Well, I am off to start din-din.  Gotta keep on nurs'n my family back to health!  :)

I won!

Lookie what I won! 

What a find!

Hubby and I got to go out today --without kids!!  Along our journey we came across this:

isn't it PERFECT?  It goes so well with the Halloween costume I put together for my girl!  I just had to splurge on it.  :)

Halloween Costume

So my daughter comes to me and says to me that she finally knows what she wants to be for Halloween!  She would like to be --wait for it-- a Fairy Princess Kitty-Cat.  

Right.  Suuurrre.  Not a problem, kid!  Do they even sell such a costume???   Mmmhmmm  Sure, they do!  Right next to the Ninja Fairy Dinosaur costume. 

Sooo I decided to tackle this one myself.  My daughter is VERY into dress-up clothes, so all previous Halloween costumes end up becoming a regular dress-up clothes after, so I never felt bad about buying her costume.  I knew she'd make great use of it.  In fact, the actual kitty costume we got her three years back is still worn to this day!  Granted, the tutu is teeny on her -she must wear pants under!! and the tail is kinda shaggy.. but it is oh so loved!  So I figured if I did come up with something, I had to make sure it would last and perhaps even be an upgrade to her itty bitty kitty costume.

So we started out with a pettiskirt that we have.  Then I found an old garage sale shirt that we got her last year.  It had a slight stain, but I could work with it and get it covered.  And then my daughter remembered she had a leopard print tights.  Granted, they are three sizes too small but she was so excited about them that I told her I'd make it work -somehow.

So off to Hobby Lobby I went to find some supplies to help me.  I got some marabou, some felt fabric that had hot pink leopard print on it and some faux fur fabric with leopard print.  I priced ribbons at Hobby Lobby and noticed that RABOM had more ribbon quanity for less money PLUS they had free shipping that weekend, so I ordered some leopard print ribbons in pink and ivory, some hot pink sheer ribbon, and brown satin ribbon.  I also added a foam headband to my cart and a plastic headband since I wasn't sure which one I'd like best to use for the ears. 

When all the supplies arrived, I got to work!  I ended up using the foam headband.  I covered it with the brown satin ribbon, using the glue gun to adhere it.  I then cut out the faux fur into triangle pieces, inserted floral wire in the ear and then glued it shut.  The floral wire helped me shape the ears.  I then attached the ears to the back of the satin covered ribbon and voila!  I also added a touch of marabou between the ears.  Sooo cute!  My daughter is in love with the ears!!!

The shirt was pretty easy, too.  I cut out the hot pink leopard felt fabric and added an itty bitty bit of hot glue around the edge of the fabric and glued it to the shirt.  I added some wax paper in between the shirt before attempting to glue the fabric on.  I was afraid I'd end up gluing the back and front of the shirt together LOL now, that wouldn't be such a good thing to have happen, eh?

I added some marabou to the cuff of the shirt and around the neck.   It looked so darling!!!   We also ended up sewing the marabou tail to the back of the shirt.  Since she wasn't wearing it tucked it, it worked well.  Plus, then we didn't have to ruin our pretty pettiskirt and it could be reused without the kitty attire.  I used embroidery floss and hand sewed the marabou to the shirt.  Really easy!

Now what's a Fairy Princess Kitty-Cat without a magic wand??  My girl had painted a wooden star wand a loong time ago.  I had her dig it up and got her permission to alter it to match her new costume.  She totally agreed!  I painted the stick portion brown and the star pink.  Then I traced the star on the hot pink leopard print fabric twice, cut the fabric and then sprayed it with my Elmer's multi-purpose spray adhesive.  I love that it allowed for repositioning it!  I got it just right after a couple of tries and it was perfect!!   Then I tied several ribbons around it, added also tulle to it and put a dab of hot glue to ensure the ribbon and tulle don't come off!  A Fairy Princess Kitty-Cat does a lot of magic and we wouldn't want that wand coming apart!!

Now to tackle the too small tights.  I cut off the feet and top portion..  I then hemmed the bottom and tops of both and voila!  I now had leopard print leggings.   Sooo cute!   So there ya have it:

Now the final touch would be the wings!  Which is not depicted in the picture, but I can assure you that her pink set of wings from LAST year's fairy costume matches perfectly and she will be wearing that along with the costume I made her :)  Sooo soooo cute!!   My girl absolutely adores her Fairy Princess Kitty-Cat costume and that is all that matters to me!!

Sweet 16 Party Plans

My cousin will be 16 this month and had turned to me for some party theme ideas.  First thing I did was ask her what she liked, what colors, what stuff she enjoyed.  After getting some feedback, I went online and started doing some searching.  I came across a few ideas but the one my cousin seemed to really like was the following.  Oh, I should also mention that it ended up being the same theme design as her bedroom --without my knowing!  (I haven't been to their place yet, so no idea!)

I also went ahead and designed her invitation:

She is totally going with this theme and I can't wait to see how it turns out!!!   I love party planning, don't you? :)



Cakeballs With a Twist

Cakeballs are all the rage.  Traditionally you bake a cake, crumble it up, add a frosting to it, roll into balls and refrigerate (or freeze if you're as impatient as I) and voila!  YUMMY!

Before I even knew what a cakeball was, I had a recipe that was passed down to me from my mother who got it from her mother...  it was a recipe to simply not waste leftover cakes and cookies. 

My mother would gather leftover cakes from after the holiday hoopla and would mash it all up, she'd also add teabiscuits or cookies she had lying around and crumble them, too, and add it to the mishmash in her big bowl.  She'd stir it all up and then go prepare the chocolate.  She'd get some baking chocolate, some butter, sugar, coffee, add a little chocolate liquor, or irish creme` liquor or somesuch to the mix and stir it in a double boiler until it was all melted.  Then she'd pour the hot mixture over the crumbly mishmash in her big bowl, mix it all up and add a wee bit of water if there was any need.  She'd roll some into balls and sometimes make long logs.  She'd top it off with coconut shaving and refrigerate.  Delish!!

It has a  vastly different taste than the traditional cakeballs we see everywhere.  I used to make it for the holidays but didn't know what to call it lol  my mother had no name it for it, either.  It was simply a recipe that was used to not waste food!  How ingenious, huh? 

I'll give you the recipe but honestly, I eyeball it and add a wee bit more of this or that...  here's a rough idea of what is added:

• About 1/2 a bar of baking chocolate (I break off about 4 pieces usually)
• 1/4 cup of sugar
• 1 stick of butter
• 3/4 cup of instant coffee

Stir the chocolate, sugar and butter on a double boiler.  Stir stir stir till it's all melted... add the coffee, and you can add some liquor if you wish.  I've even added a capful of butter rum.  When rolling it into balls and you notice it's still a bit dry, you can add more coffee or water to it. 

And there ya go!  Easy peasy!  I've called it rum balls, irish creme` balls lol   Honestly never thought to call it cakeballs, but I guess technically that is what they are -cakeballs with a twist!


If you repost this recipe please give credit where credit is due and link to my blog, please.  Thank ye kindly! :)

Birds of a feather..

I love birds.

I love vintage birds.

Soo combine the two and I give you:

I needed a piece for my living room redo that I could use as inspiration.  Granted, I'm a long way from actually redoing my living room, but this will be a treasured piece that will help with it when I am ready.

I had lots of fun doing this and it was easy peasy to do!  I used an 8x8 piece of wood that I had lying around from a previous project.  I then asked my daughter if I could rip out two pages from her coloring book that she didn't like.  She kindly obliged.  I glued the coloring pages, overlapping them and tucking them in the back neatly.  I then used my good friend, Gesso, to prime the piece for my acrylic paints. 

I used so many colors..  a tannish color as the base, let it dry, then a white, let it dry, then sanded it lightly, then a mix of blues and greens, sanded it again..  used some Crackle to give it a worn aged look, then sanded again..  and then just to throw in a bit of fun, I painted on some Sparkle Glaze (by Delta Ceramcoat) to give it a soft iridescent look.  And voila!  That's how I got the piece to look perfect for me!

Now I needed my finishing touch, the vintage bird.  I found so many AMAZING vintage pieces here.  LOVE that site!   I printed my lovely bird and adhered it to the center of my piece and voila!  I give you my work of art.  :)