Plants Versus Zomies Birthday Party

 

For Parker's 7th birthday we did a Plants Versus Zombies Theme. The banner Chad made for Parker was totally awesome!

 

Parker loved the cake I made him!

 



 

I made individual dirt cakes for everyone. I made the sunflowers out of gum paste and junior mint candies.  The caution cones, pea shooters and fence around the cake were also made of from gum paste. The big caution cone on the zombie head was made from an ice cream sugar cone and more gum paste. I used  Lu cookies for the headstones. I used the Wilton 3-D Skull Pan to make a red velvet zombie head. The eyeballs are Lindor White Chocolate Truffles. And his teeth are mini marshmallows. The bottom layer was a marble cake with my cream cheese frosting. I used Wilton's food color paste to make the green and grey color.

 

I used green Twizzlers to make the stems for the flower pots.

 

 

I also had some fun RIP, eyeball, and hand picks that I stuck in cupcakes and flower pots.

I wanted parents and kids to have their own dessert to take home in additional to goodie bags.

 

 

Chad found some Plants Versus Zombie toys on Amazon. There are so darn funny! 

 

 

Wilton 3-D Skull Pan

 

Here's my cream cheese frosting recipe...

 

Cream Cheese Frosting

 

2 packages Cream Cheese

1 container Fleischmann's Olive Oil Spread - approx 1 cup

1 bag Confectioner's Sugar - approx 10 cups

tsp Vanilla Extract

 

Let cream cheese set out until room temperature. Combine cream cheese and Freshman's until smooth. Slowly begin stirring in powdered sugar. I cover my mixer with a damp towel to prevent sugar dust flying everywhere. Add a vanilla and continue mixing for about 10 minutes. If you prefer your frosting a bit thicker, simply add more powdered sugar.

 

 

Here's my dirt cake recipe....

 

Dirt Cake

 

1  package Oreo cookies

1 package cream cheese, room temperature

1 stick of butter, room temperature

4 small packages instant French vanilla pudding

4 3/4 cups milk

16-ounce carton Cool Whip, let sit out until soft

 

Use food processor to crumble Oreos until they look like dirt. Set aside.

 

In a large bowl, combine cream cheese and butter, and stir until smooth. Set aside.

 

In another large bowl, mix together instant-pudding mixes and milk. Fold pudding mixture into cream-cheese mixture. Fold in whipped cream.

 

Alternate layers of "dirt" and pudding mix.

 

I also made Parker a fun Happy Birthday banner.

 

Here's a close up of a brown glitter letter.

 

Parker certainly had a great birthday this year!



Our Kitchen Updates

Back in December we started on updating the kitchen by changing the color again. Although I loved the color, Chad was not loving it. It definitely feels like a more modern color now. I love it with all the shades of brown, plus it really looks nice with the stainless steel appliances and my stained glass.

Chad installed both up lighting and under the cabinet lighting. I love way it reflects on the glass tiles.

 

In January I had Natural Stone World come and install the granite. I had 3 different companies come give me estimates. They all said my kitchen measured about 65 square feet without a back splash, and they all were very similar in price. It became clear I needed to have them do the counters. Notice that small piece of granite on the cabinet by the refrigerator behind my Kitchenaide. Natural Stone World won my business because they were the only company to tell me I would need a piece of granite in that corner. If not, there would be a gap between the counter and the cabinet. Because the walls aren't perfectly square, if a piece of paper or food crumbs fell in that small space I would never be able to them out.

 

 

One other small detail that made Natural Stone World stand out was suggesting to extend the counter just slightly past the wall. It really looks fantastic! This picture was taken before Chad added the case molding.

 

 

We asked the people that bought our last house if they would consider selling us the stained glass lighting we had in the kitchen. Luckily they really did not like it and wanted new lighting. Yay! At first Chad thought I was totally off my rocker wanting to ask them to sell it to me. Especially knowing that we would have bought it twice. But Lowe's only sells one style now,  the rest of the lighting has been discontinued. I couldn't help it, I just love it and think stained glass fits beautifully in a craftsman style home.

 

One of the reasons I feel in love with this house was because of the open floor plan.

It's nice to be able to cook and keep an eye on Parker playing in the living room.

There are a few other things we did in the kitchen to update it that are not obvious. Chad installed a pull out spice rack to the right of the refrigerator, added a pull out trash cans to the left of the dishwasher, changed the faucet, added pull handles under the sink and the under sink mount kit which holds sponges etc.

 

 

Yesterday Chad & I celebrated our 18 year anniversary! Wow! It does not feel real saying that. The time has passed so quickly. I don't feel any older, just a bit wiser :)

He bought me the most beautiful roses!

Chad added the case molding in-between the kitchen and living room. He did such a fabulous job! It really looks like it should have always been there.

 

 

Doesn't the case molding make a huge difference! And look at the difference a wide angle makes.

 

 

We added about 14 more inches of counter space. I helped Chad install these beautiful and huge corbels. Not only were they needed to support the longer counter, but they were needed for more character and style. It's really nice having a place to sit at the counter now.

 

 

Here's a close-up of the butterfly beige granite. I love it!

 

Hehehe, this picture is on it's side. The glass mosaic tiles came from Lowe's, a color called mahogany. My stained glass skills and tools certainly came in handy when Chad and I were putting the back splash in.

 

Here's a picture of how the kitchen looked before the makeover. This one and the next picture were actually used in the marketing of the house for sale.  A wide angle lens makes such a huge difference in getting a good picture of a room. You can't tell that the ceiling is so high and that the cabinets go all the way up. The counters really were in pretty good condition, but the granite is so fine now!

 



 

The kitchen is huge, so a light color was not necessary to make it look big and airy. The paint color was to close to the trim color.  All the trim and crown molding was not noticeable before.

Wide Angle Lens Love

 

I'm pretty excited about the new wide angel lens I bought for my camera yesterday!

 I've been wanting one for months. I finally went to Dury's in Nashville and bought a Tamron 10-24mm lens. It made it so much easier to take a picture of my bathroom. Before I would have needed to take 3 pictures just to capture everything in this one picture.

Back in December we painted our bathroom again. Yeah, I finally got around to buy the lens so I could take this picture. This color is from Valspar, it's called Bamboo. I think it's the perfect khaki, brownish, greenish color.  Look how all the wood and molding pops now! I'm lucky to have such a large bathroom and I love the vaulted ceiling!

And look at that beautiful orchid! My friend Cheryl bought it for me over 6 weeks ago and the blooms still look fabulous!

 

 

 Back in November I posted this picture of our bathroom after adding the picture frame molding around the mirrors. Seriously look at the difference the lens makes.

Although brown is my favorite color, this shade was just not perfect. We needed more contrast between the wood and wall color.

 

 

Do you remember this picture? I still do not understand why it was used to market our home when it was fore sale. Notice how the molding is lost with that light cream color.

 It definitely feels more spa like now!

Locks Of Love Donation

 

 

Now that summer is here it was time to donate my hair to Locks Of Love again. It had gotten so long that it was beginning to get annoying closing it in my car door all the time. lol

I do feel luck that it grows so fast. For the past 10 years, about every 2 years I have been able to donate at least 12 inches of my hair.

 

 

This year I was able to donate 15 inches! Wow! I did not realize it had gotten that long! It's kinda funny just how much darker my hair looked after all that length was cut off.

 Even with my salt & pepper :)

 

Locks of Love provides hairpieces to financially disadvantaged children in the United States and Canada suffering from long-term medical hair loss. Their mission is to return a sense of self, confidence and normalcy to children suffering from hair loss by utilizing donated ponytails to provide the highest quality hair prosthetics. 

 

Please consider donating your hair the next time you get it cut.

 

Here is their contact information...

 

Locks of Love

234 Southern Blvd

West Palm Beach, FL 33405

561-833-7332

561-833-7962 (fax)

http://locksoflove.org/index.html

Donation Form: http://locksoflove.org/HairDonationForm.pdf
 

 

Our Backyard Retreat is Complete

 

I'm so happy to be finished with all the major outdoor projects! 

 

It's so nice to have such a wonderful space to entertain or just relax in.

 

Since we had the cement slabs poured at different times, Chad painted the concrete a light sand color.

To give us a little more privacy in the backyard, we built a 6 foot privacy fence that's probably about 32 feet long. We did not want to fence the entire backyard because we would lose the view of huge open field. 

 

 

 Weekends are beginning to feel more like a vacation. Now that summer is here, we've cooled the hot tub down. We can splash around in the tub while enjoying a little Bob Marley on the outdoor speakers. It's so nice having the outdoor refrigerator under the bar. We can keep plenty of drinks cold, and food to through on the grill. 

Chad did an amazing job designing and building the pergola. Not to mention the fireplace, bar and "brick rug".  I did the "easy job" of staining the fence, while he stained the pergola.

 

 

The landscaping has come such a long way since we bought our home last year!

Can you even believe it's the same place!?!



Creating The Perfect Backyard Retreat

We are in the process of creating the perfect backyard retreat.

Soon it will feel like we are on vacation at home!

Wait until you see the pergola!!!

Shabby Chic Dress Form

Over twelve years ago I worked for The Limited and when my store closed this dress form was going to be put in a dumpster. I just couldn't see it going into a landfill. I originally thought I would try to grow plants and moss on it as a cool garden statue, but Chad hated the idea. I still think that would be really cool!

Over the years I've mostly used it at Halloween dressed up as the Headless Horseman.

note: I think this is the only picture I have left of the before of my counter tops. We've repainted the kitchen again too. Soon I'll post my kitchen makeover.

Recently I decided to make it a bit prettier. I used Mod Podge to glue scraps of text paper all over the form. I used Scor-tape to add the pretty lace at the bottom to make her a skirt. Instead of the attic her new home is in my craft room next to my treadmill. It's now pretty inspiration to get my butt in gear on it!

I found this lovely bird jewelery finding at Hobby Lobby and just knew I had to have it to make this necklace. In the fabric dept with ribbon I found the crystal and pearl beaded strand sold by the yard. Such a perfect piece to make a necklace, no time consuming work required.

Here is a close up of the satin ribbon flower I made to hide the seam where the ribbon overlaps.

The third necklace is a fun find from an Etsy shop. When I saw this Dandelion Wish Necklace I knew it would be perfect for my shabby chic dress form!

I thought I'd share my Shabby Chic Dress Form with The Charm Of Home, Common Ground,

Stone Gable, The Shabby Nest, Jennifer Rizzo, Craft Berry Bush, Let's Get Shabby and

Tatertots And Jello.

Home Improvment Check List

The last year has totally flown by! It's kinda hard to believe we have lived here one whole year already. We have worked so hard on making our house feel like Home. Before we moved in last year we made a list of things we needed to buy and projects we wanted to complete. It was a long list! We have done just about all of it. And added some projects as we went along. Some projects were because of discovering issues with the house, others just to make it a bit nicer.
 

 

Chad's list... painters caulk in all rooms, caulk bathrooms, down spouts replace back of house, fix garage door, replace door knobs & add dead bolts, paint all rooms, fix shower tub upstairs, remove and re-caulk kitchen counters, replace door bell, replace window locks in dining room, clean air ducts, replace air registers or maybe fix, sand & paint front columns, trim bushes, weed flower beds, paint garage floor, replace outdoor lights. I have no idea what the last thing on his list says. lol
I added door guard for bathroom upstairs to his list. My handwriting is terrible. So I tend to print in all caps in order for someone else to try to make it out what I have written.

Here is my list.. paint, granite, new carpet, kitchen dining set, formal dining room set, slip covers, area rug, shed, deck and pergola, grass, refinish floors and stain darker, picture frame molding around mirrors, new toilet seats, new door locks and keys, fence, blinds, paint garage floor, shrubs, shower curtain, dryer, bistro set for front porch, fireplace, grill, fire extinguishers, cabinets, guest room bed, ironing board, bookshelf doors, glass door, bar stools, soap dispensers, clean air vents, steam mop, vacuum.

After going through my list I don't know what my problem is!?! Seriously, I don't know why I haven't bought a fire extinguisher yet! I hope I don't ever need to use one, but I still want to have one just in case of emergency.

One thing I crossed off the list was slip covers. About 10 years ago I bought a couch, chair and a half, and ottoman from Rowe Furniture that looks exactly like the Pottery Barn Charleston collection. I decided on buying it from Rowe Furniture because A) it was about $1000 less expensive, and B) even if discontinue a piece they still keep the pattern so you can buy new slips covers. With having a six year old the washer and dyer had gotten to know the slip covers very well over the years! After getting one quote from a Rowe Furniture Dealer I quickly crossed them off my list. I know that it's been 10 years and all, but I did not expect to get a quote for so much higher that what I even paid for the furniture in the first place. It was even higher than buying a new couch, chair and ottoman. Really??? Um, yes I can continue to deal with the faded fabric.

 

There was so much dog hair on the floors when we looked at the house that it reminded me of tumble weeds!!! I'm not kidding! In the pictures we took you can see gray blurry areas, it's dog hair!

 

 Whelp because of this we did not realize just how badly the hardwood floors were damaged.

You can see where the dogs ran though the house and scratched at windows and doors wanting to go outside.

Here you can get a glimpse of one of the large kennels in the living room and the back end of a big dog. I guess I did not hold still when I snapped this picture with my cell phone.

There is raw exposed wood, big gouges, dents and scratches. Most hardwood floors have a 15-20 year warranty on the finish. The house was only 5 years old, the abuse the floors suffered in about 18 months from the renters was like more like 50 years. By the time we started to clean before moving in it was too late to get the floors refinished. There were places that needed immediate attention like the stair treads that had been chewed on.

 It takes a good week to refinish hardwood floors. We needed to get moved in because staying in a hotel for a week was not in our budget.

Then Chad found a miracle product. Yes a miracle product! It's from SC Johnson called
 One Step No Buff Wax .

You can find it at my favorite store, Lowe's. It's also at other stores like Walmart.
If it's ever discontinued I will cry.
I've not been paid any any way, shape or form for mentioning this product or stores. But my feelings certainly wouldn't be hurt if a case of it made it's way to my doorstep. ;)

 We will have to put all our furniture in storage for a week while we stay in a hotel to have the floors refinished. Someday I'd like to have it done, but Parker will have to be older. I know he has plenty more oops moments ahead of him. lol

Another thing that has gotten pushed back was replacing all the carpet. I'm not sure the renters ever vacuumed! Again I am not kidding. The carpet was professionally cleaned before we moved in. There was so much hair embedded in the carpet that it clogged the man's machine and broke it on the very first bedroom. OMG! It looked like a 25-30 pound dog. Ugh so disgusting. Well after a trip to the emergency room with Parker, my budget for new carpet was blown. Parker is way more important that carpet!
We had it professionally cleaned twice. We'll get it replaced once he's older and I don't have to worry about koolaid stains or play dough.

There are only 2 more things on my list left to check off. A glass door and a bookshelf door. Spring and warmer weather is on it's way so we'll need to get a glass storm door. I love to open the front door and let natural light flood the room. The other thing on my list is "bookshelf doors". I have not talked Chad into doing it yet. The door I want replaced swings out into the room. Last time he made a secret passage it swung into the attic space.  So I know it will be a bit more challenging to make a secret door with the hinges hidden. I'm lucky to have a husband that is super talented and handy. I've seen a bunch of companies that make them starting at $1000 before shipping. It will be easily under $150 for materials to make it.

Soon I'll get the pictures up on the kitchen remodel with granite and tile back splash. Plus we decided to change the color of the living room and master bathroom. I love the new paint colors! We've bought a new hot tub which means another backyard landscaping project is in progress.

Making Valentines For Kids

 Where has the time gone!?! I can hardly believe it's almost the middle of February!

Over the weekend I helped Parker with the best homework assignment!

 The assignment was simply to address Valentine's Day cards for the other kids in his class. But why not make it a bit more fun! Instead of buying some cheap and girly looking cards we made fun robot cards for his friends and teacher.

I was pretty excited getting him to smile for a picture! I normally get a mean or crazy face. lol

Here's a close up of a boy and girl robot. Some of the boys looked like they had mustaches!

 I already had all the tools plus plenty of paper, tape, glue, and googlie eyes for us to make the cards. Poor little ol' me was out of envelopes. So what else was a girl to do. I just had to go to Hobby Lobby. They ended up being out of stock on the envelope size I needed. One option would have been 25 blank cards and envelopes for $6.99. But then I found a set of 20 fun retro circle invitations and matching envelopes at $4.99 (before the 40% off coupon). Next the only other thing I needed to buy was miniature Hershey candy bars. All together it was under $7 to make 20 Valentine's Day cards. Most importantly it was a fun project to create with Parker.

First Parker stamped Happy Valentine's Day in purple ink on all the envelopes. To make the robots I randomly cut strips of gray paper for the arms and legs. I held the crimper so Parker could load it full of the strips and turn the handle. Parker cut a bunch of squares for the robot heads. For the girl robots we used "girl googlie eyes" they are so fun because they have eyelashes. To make their lips we used a paper hole punch and I cut the dots in half. Parker decided the boys cards should only have one eye. lol  He drew the noses and mouths with a black sharpie marker. Next I had him go crazy punching red hearts. He loves making a mess punching paper. I cut strips of  green and blue paper at 1.5" x 3" to cover the Hershey's chocolate bars. Parker wanted the boy robots to be green and did not want them having hearts. He glued the hearts on the girl robots. After all the cards were assembled Parker glued the extra hearts on the envelopes for the girls in his class. Then most importantly as his homework required, he addressed the envelopes for all the kids in his class. I think his friends will love them just as much as we do!

This was the inspiration for our cards. I saw this cute robot card and knew I'd just have to make them!

I'd like to share our Valentine's with CAS On Sunday, Crafting When We Can, Come And Get It Challenges, Challenges 4 Everybody, Addicted To CAS, Inspire Me Fridays, Cards For Men,
 and Tatertots and Jello.

The Stuck On You Giveaway Winner is...

The Stuck On You Giveaway winner is Basement Stamper who said "The stationary sets are great, but I have to say that I love the laundry hampers! I'd definitely use the $$$ to buy one of those, they have such wonderful assortment of gifts."

Congratulations! I am sure you will love your laundry hamper!

She has a crafty blog too. I hope you will all stop by and check out all her lovely creations!

There really are so many fun products that Stuck On You makes from personalized labels, clothing, wooden blocks, stationary, to backpacks and lunch boxes.

If you follow them on Facebook you can keep up with all the latest news and possibly catch a coupon.