Back to school flag, back to school, ruler flag

 It's that time of the year again. Back to routine. I made a few ruler flags this year for my back-to-school first day photos. I made them super girly since the back-to-school pictures are for me anyway. I just love pink and lots of glitter!

Check out my other post for some more back-to-school printables. Thank you for stopping by!

Fairy Garden, bird house, succulents, crystal charm, bead charm

 I just love fairy gardens. My only problem is that I never put fairies in them. Just the illusion that a fairy is nearby and that you have stumbled upon their home. I used fake succulents, moss, marbles, wooden disks and a cute wooden bird house that my dad made for me. I also hung a bead and crystal charm on the bird house to help catch some light. I even included a cute little bumblebee rock that a friend painted for me.

Hot Cocoa Spoons

           d  It's that chilly time of the year d

  Time to cozy up with a cup of hot cocoa in front of a crackling fire, and enjoy the season!! 

I made these chocolate covered cocoa spoons for my brothers wedding. They had a cocoa bar with lots of fun toppings and these chocolate covered stirring spoons. We made several different options hoping to please the crowd!

 

 

I purchased wooden spoons online, then hand stamped the names on each handle. 

Dipped them in chocolate then added candy canes, sprinkles and edible pearls. 

Then placed them in the freezer until they set up. They were super easy to make and turned out really cute!

After the reception we had a few left over that we popped in the freezer for later. 

They lasted several months too!

                  d Happy Holiday’s d

Halloween Wreath

 Here are 2 wreaths that I made for Halloween last year.

I have been making quite a few deco mesh wreaths lately, they are fun and easy to make!!

This wreath is made with burlap and floral picks.Very time consuming but I think it turned out great!

Ditching Auto Mode :)

Just so you know auto mode is NOT your friend. I love my camera but feel like it has too many flaws. Well guess what, it's not the camera it's me. That's right, I have not been taking advantage of my cameras full potential for years now, how about try ever. I have been wanting to know how to shoot manually for awhile now and always felt like I was way in over my head every time I tried to look into it. Well I am still in over my head but decided to take baby steps. One of the helpful sites that I have been using is My 3 Boybarians. I have been doing her "31 Days to a Better Photo" very, very helpful. Each day you learn some thing new about your camera, "baby steps" just what I needed.
My first experiment was on the Christmas tree. The Unskinny Bobby has a great post about shooting Christmas tree's.


Let me show you what I mean.....

Here is my tree in auto mode. It makes my tree look messy and not very attractive.

You cant even tell that the lights are on on the tree.

 (can you find our Elf on the Shelf??)

Using Unskinny's tutorial I shot this in manual mode.

Fun huh!! I feel like this picture is one I could actually keep or scrapbook.

And no before you ask, I did not mess with this in photo shop.

I only added text to the top of the picture and voila, done!

Ready for another example??

Basket shot in auto-mode, not bad. The lighting isn't great though.

In order to get the right lighting on the basket, the flower on the top got over exposed.This is something that can easily be fixed in photo shop. I wanted to show this photo without any editing so I am leaving it the way it is for now. There is also a funny shadow on the wall from my window, remember I am still learning so obviously this picture is not perfect.

My main problem with my taking pictures is lighting, lighting, lighting. My camera always wants to use flash so most of the time I have to turn it to the auto setting without flash. The problem with this is that I can't take advantage of any other features. Manual mode is defiantly my new friend.


It's been fun learning a little more about my camera.
I hope this post inspires you to "ditch auto mode"

Baby steps!!

Mermaid Pirate Birthday Party

Here we go..... the 4rd Mermaid Birthday party for my daughter. Ya, she loves mermaids. We rotate between mermaids and My Little Pony Birthday parties. You would think that I am a pro by now, so not the case. I did however want to show off all the hard work that went into this party!!

My daughter has made a lot of friends that are boys so we wanted to accommodate both boys and girls. So we made this party a Mermaid Pirate Party!

My Inspiration...

 Thank you Fiskars.

Let the fun begin....

Me and my Sister-in-law went crazy on my new chalk board from Chalk Couture. I am in love with this board!! We used chalk pens which are totally erasable. The possibilities are endless, I can't wait for every new holiday so that I can dress it up accordingly. Any who back to my awesome drawing skills, LOL... NOT!!

My Sister-in-law is pretty artistic, not so much me :{ At least not at drawing.

It was actually a lot of fun to do this scene. You can't really tell from the picture but we used shimmer pens and glitter. All the coins in the treasure box are sparkly and so is the sun.

We had grand plans for the cake but in the end we settled for cupcakes.

 Here is the ice cream bar with all the fun toppings

 

 

I am kinda regretting the laminated sea shell, it seamed like a good addition to the treasure box at the time. Oh well... Just hold your hand out in front of your right eye... better?? good!

 We had a Pirate Scavenger Hunt for one of the activities.
I printed these maps on khaki card stock and then rolled them up like treasure maps.
I added fun things like: walk the plank and give me your best pirate arrr...

I had all the kids choose to be a mermaid or a pirate. When we played Red Rover I separated the kids based on what they chose. It was really funny to see the boys getting called over to the mermaid side and then get stuck there. At least they were really good sports!!

One of the kids said "My Mom does not let me have tattoo's"...aahhh I did not think about that.
 Sorry Mom's, you can blame me when they get their first tattoo...
"Remember that birthday party I went to when I was a kid, the one with the fake tattoos...
well ever since that day I have always wanted a real tattoo."
Watch it be one of my kids!! Ha ha...

 
Here is the print out for the Tattoo station

Here is my inspiration for the party favors...
Totally forgot to take a picture of the ones that I made, I am special like that!
Thank you to Stephanie from the Couture Parties for remembering to click a pic!
If you want to see Stephanie's tutorial click here.

These are the print outs that I used on my tags. I printed them out then backed them with red card stock and then used a small star punch to make the hole on the top of the tag. They turned out really cute!

Here is my inspiration for the jelly fish...
Thank you Party City for this fun jelly fish tutorial!

Here are mine!!

Phew, done until next year. Yay!!