HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

It’s finally here!

The one day a year I let myself indulge in all the candyliciousness I can get my hands on……..and not feel horribly guilty about it.

{Only mildly guilty}.

Last week we got out sweet tooth’s warmed up for this glorious occasion with some cake pops. Shockingly it was my first attempt at making them.

Even more shockingly, I hadn’t waited till I HAD to make them for some party or event before giving it a go.

Typically this is a little more my style,

“Oh, sure! I’d love to make some cake pops for your beautiful baby’s first birthday where you’ll have trillions of your closest family and friends and will be telling EVERY.ONE. who made the cake pops for you!”

{Me in the kitchen the night before the party}

“ #$*&@#!% ^&*%$#@!!!!!! “

You get the picture :)

Whatever I’m making always turns out {thank God}, but I’d forgotten what it was like to have a stress free, and FUN, baking experience. These were just for us, who cares what they end up looking like.

{Ok, me. I care. I really, Really, REALLY care. And if they’d have turned out horribly misshapen and ugly I wouldn’t be posting about them}.

“Huh? Nope. I didn’t make any cake pops. You must be thinking of someone else”.

But I’m happy to say….

“Yes! I MADE THESE!”

They turned out really cute! Not perfect, but for a first attempt I was really pleased, AND surprised how easy they were.

Take a peek at my Mummy & Monster Pops.

I hope you enjoyed to pics! I’d love to hear about your adventures in Cake Popping and hope that you and your families have a great Halloween.

Thanks so much for reading!

Halloween Decorations at Our House

T-minus 10 days and counting till Halloween! Yippee!!

I love Halloween.

Not sure if it’s because it’s an excuse for me to dress up OR because my girls collect mountains of candy……that I get to “inspect”. Can you believe they don’t like Tootsie Rolls?! Could I produce a child that doesn’t like Tootsie Rolls?! Apparently I can. And did. 3 times. :)

I thought I’d share with all of you fine people some of the ways I’ve decorated for this fun holiday.

I wanted to keep things fairly monochromatic this year, so I mostly used black {of course}, white, off-white and bronze.

Take a look.

Let me know what you think.

I’d love to hear about how you’ve decorated.

I made this spider egg sack with batting, cheese cloth, hot glue and lots of little black plastic spiders.

May not be as realistic as one you'd buy, BUT it's waaaaaay cheaper! High five!!

A black crow I picked up at, yep, you guessed it, Dollar Tree.

I perched it on some old glass bottles I have in my dining room.

A Dollar Tree rat. Got this guy on a recent Vegas trip.

Yes, I just admitted to going to Dollar Tree while in Las Vegas. Why gamble when you can buy something this freakin' cool for only a buck!

This spider started out a glow-in-the-dark whiteish color.

Wasn't working for me.

A little black spray paint and we're good to go.

Add a revamped Dollar Tree pumpkin, and put it all under a glass dome.

{keep reading and you'll see a better pic of the pumpkin and hear what I did to it}

Here's a shot of the mantle.

Some more cheese cloth with little black spiders, a couple of bronze color pumpkins, a black crow and a GIANT spider.

I love it!

Btw, I picked up the spider in the "dollar section" at Target for only $2.50!

This arrangement is inside my fireplace on a mirrored tray.

I got some wood logs from our wood pile, scraped off the bark and cut them in various sizes.

Add some faux pumpkins and candles for a great {and easy} fall/Halloween look that'll work all the way into Thanksgiving.

I added these rubber spiders every so often around the living room.

They actually work pretty good at freaking you out.

Just ask my girls, they're always scaring each other with them.

Here's the revamped Dollar Tree pumpkin I talked about earlier.

You may have seen these at Dollar Tree.

They had some aesthetically UNpleasing silk/plastic "arrangement" {if you can even call it that} coming out the top.

I ripped that crap out as soon and I got them home, then painted them an off white.

I made the stem out of some rope, using hot glue to build it and secure it to the pumpkin.

These faux pumpkins started out bright orange but some off white paint fixed them right up.

I stacked them on top of each other, put them out by the front door and voila!

I hope you enjoyed the pics and maybe even got some ideas for a little last minute decorating in your own home.

Thanks for reading!

I’d love it if you’d consider following and sharing with your friends.

Have a GREAT weekend!

Baby Ruby’s Shower

Yikes! I’ve SERIOUSLY been neglecting this blog….is history repeating itself? I certainly hope not! Allow me to attempt redemption with this post.

I recently had the pleasure of designing a baby shower for a client who had so much on her plate, she gave me free reign to do whatever I liked. I’m not gonna lie, IT.WAS.GREAT!! Here’s what I came up with:

The baby carriage was loaned by a dear friend whom didn’t mind me changing it from brown to pink, in fact I’m pretty sure she’s always wanted it pink ;)

I couldn’t resist making some tissue paper pom pom’s! They’re just too dang cute…..and soooooo easy! The pink and white polka dot back drop is just wrapping paper. Doesn’t get easier than that.

The throw pillow covers were made from fabric remenants and embellished with pink jewel trim {both purchased at Digger, aka The Bins, the Goodwill Outlet, Best.Place.Ever. If you’ve never been, you don’t know what you’re missing!} .

I made a coordinating slipcover for two square ottomans to make a place the guest of honor could rest her feet while opening gifts. The white bench is my own.

I got this giant old frame {also purchased at Digger}, painted it white and stapled some burlap {free from CL} to the inside. Then I spray pained the pink stripes and painted the name on. Lastly I added some jewel trim to the frame and some jewled silk flowers to the burlap. I hung it above the food table and the sweet mommy-to-be got to keep it. She plans on hanging it in the baby’s room.

With the help of my mom, I made a GINORMOUS tu-tu for our food table to “wear”.

I convinced M to help tackle yet another project for me. He made me this PERFECT cupcake stand! He is such a keeper! I painted it, added a tu-tu and small metal dress form {that I also painted and added the tu-tu and jewels to}. I LOVE how it turned out!

The back drop is gathered vinyl tablecloths, another one of my favorite inexpensive tricks.

I hope you enjoyed the pics. Thanks for waiting so patiently for a post, and even more thanks for reading. I’d love it if you’d consider following or sharing with a friend!

Have a great weekend!

Hot Potato

What do you get when you combine an ottoman straight off the set of “That 70’s Show” with a potato sack vest {for what type of occasion does one even wear a potato sack vest}? I know you’re thinking that all you get is to take those two ‘fine’ pieces straight to the nearest Goodwill and leave them there.

I, however, had a little something else in mind.

I was thinking something more like this. Burlap is becoming a major trend in decorating. You can use it for the home and for parties. It’s inexpensive and doesn’t require any hemming {a HUGE plus for this gal}.

What do you think? Love it? Hate it? I’d love to hear about ways you’ve used burlap to decorate! Thanks for reading and have a fantastic day :)

To Free or Not To Free

Let me share with you a little something about myself, something that brings me much happiness……as long as it goes the way I want it to. Honestly, that’s how I feel about most things. Do what I want you to do, go the way I want you to go, do what I tell you to do, and I’m happy. A bit of a control freak are we? Yup. That’s me. That’s not what I planned on sharing. Hmmmm…..lemme get back on track here.

Ok, here we go. I.Love.Free crap. I’m totally guilty of stopping to pick up those free couches you see on the side of the road. By the time I’ve got the POJunk loaded in the back of the truck I can already picture how AMAZING it’s going to look once I recover it……and bug bomb it…..and let the soggy cushions dry out…..and fix the broken arm. BUT hey, it’s free so I NEEEED to take it. If I don’t someone else will and they’ll get all the fun of turning it into something fantastic. It takes about 5.7 minutes for the takers remorse to set it. First, I start to get a nervous feeling in my stomach about what I’ll have to say to M (aka the hubs) for him to let me keep it. Secondly, I start to do the math on how much fabric I’m going to need to reupholster this GREAT couch. Even if I find fabric for a steal it’s still going to add up, making this free couch not so free anymore. Thirdly, I think about the bugs. For all I know this couch could be crawling in crawlies. And I.Don’t.Do.Bugs. Once, our dog got fleas and I freaked. I bombed the house three times, treated all the carpets, flea dipped the dog twice and swore that if I saw one more flea I’d be putting a for sale sign in the front yard. Did I mention that I saw a whopping THREE FLEAS on the dog? Did I also mention that I.DON’T.DO.BUGS?! Anyway, when I pull into the driveway at home I stop and unload the couch. I leave it there, at the end of the driveway with a sign on it. Know what that sign says? FREE

BUT sometimes I find free stuff that’s actually worth the taking. Like this chair. You may recognize it from the Something Blue bridal shower.

It was a little wobbly and needed a new seat, but those are inexpensive fixes that I can actually manage AND no bug bombs necessary, which is a major plus :)

So, with some paint, fabric, foam, batting, sand paper and handyman help from M, here’s the old chair now.

It's shabby and has small character building flaws, but I love it………..and all it’s freebie goodness.