Cake pops!

Have you heard of these?

I was just introduced to them this week by my good friend Misty.

Seriously, I never knew what I was missing!! They are delicious!

And not to mention, adorable!!

You can make them as basic or elaborate as you would like. These are definitely more on the elaborate side, but just for fun, here are a few pictures of inspiration from the experts at Bakerella...

Adorable, right??

Well, Misty & I tried our hand at them last night.

Here are the basic directions...

1. Bake and cool one 13x9 cake, according to package directions. After it has cooled, smash it up and mix in 1 can of frosting. It's a fun & messy project! Refrigerate the mixture for 15 minutes.

2. Form the mixture into balls (or whatever) & insert a sucker stick into each one. (To prevent bobble-head balls, dip the end of your stick into melted candy melts and then insert them into the balls.) Refrigerate them for another 15 minutes.

3. Melt your candy melts or chocolate bark and dip the cake balls. Add glitter, sprinkles, faces (for you advanced Martha Stewarts), etc..

4. Stick each pop into a block of styrofoam so that the chocolate can harden. And voila! It's that easy!! We made Christmas presents using chocolate bark and red icing.

Are they perfect? Heavens no. Are they perfectly yummy? You bet!

Happy baking!

Photo Wall

Have you noticed that most of the pictures that I share of my house are zoomed in really close?? That's because I have a TON of blank wall space still left to decorate! It's a problem that keeps me up at night. Seriously!!

Blank spot #1 is in my front living room.

Notice, no walls shown?

But what was once blank & boring now has 4 8x10s of my family. Fitting for a family room, don't you think?! Should I add more?? I probably should have zoomed out further so that you could see my entire wall, but I guess I'm still fearful of showing too much "blankness".

I ordered the pictures in sepia, which I LOVE. It gives them a classic look & hides the pop of pink that my daughters have on, which would more than likely have clashed with the red accents that I have in the room.

But the best part of all...I get to see their sweet faces every time I walk through the living room to... answer the door, answer the phone, track down the laundry basket, find a lost toy.. You get the point. :)

All decorating should make me this happy.

Pantry Redo

When I saw this pantry makeover that Decor Chick did a few months ago I was totally inspired and motivated to get mine done. When we moved in a year ago we did a total rehaul on a lot of the spaces in our home. One of those was the pantry. Five college guys had lived here before us and lets just say the shelves in the pantry were nasty and in our opinion, not worth saving. So my hubby and a handy college student from our church built the new shelves themselves. We'd always planned on painting them and making them nice...but time and money (and energy) ran out and we just lived with the raw wood shelves for over a year. Finally it was time!!!

This is how I was living! (sorry for the poor photo quality but you get the picture, right!)

Oh I am so embarrased to show this to you! It was awful and I didn't mess it up to make it look worse... this is truly how our pantry functioned. Wow... that's humbling. :)

After a coat of paint on the wall and shelves and the addition of the canisters and other organization stuff I'd been collecting over a few months... here it is today!!!

And these awesome lazy susans built by my handsome helper. Seriously... these are awesome and he worked VERY hard on them!

My pantry now functions and looks 100x better!

I got these shelves from Wallyworld to store some of the "what do I do with these?" items.

And these canisters keep our snacky foods

And this basket stolen from the playroom keeps the paper goods that just were cluttered up on top of the shelves before.

I'd had these baskets for a while to hold our bread and chips.

And remember when I showed you the kitchen cabinet makeover? I told you I'd moved the kids crafty stuff to the pantry. Here's their corner. I got these drawers to hold coloring books, stickers, markers, paints, etc. SO much better than the cluttered cabinet.

I am loving the new pantry. My husband has even given me major props! He was once skeptical about all the canisters instead of boxes...but now I'm pretty sure he's a believer. And I couldn't have done it without him... all the painting, wood shelves and trim and Amazing lazy susans are credited to him! He's pretty much the greatest.

Linked here:
Making the World Cuter
Between Naps on the Porch
Keeping it Simple

Garlands

I've fallen in love with garlands this Fall.

I picked up a few in Canton for super cheap (I'm talking $4 cheap!!) and have had fun moving them around my house. They're simple & classic and add texture and interest to just about any space. I feel like I'm decorating with out having to really decorate.

Painting on walls

I love finding inspirations in catalogs of things I'll never be able to do or afford. I've torn things out of catalogs a hundred times to put in my "eventually I'll do this" file. I've been unhappy with how my four-year old daughter's room has looked since we got her a new bed and rearranged her room. She had this long wall with nothing on it that couldn't be filled with any more furniture. When I saw this picture in the Pottery Barn Kids catalog I was inspired!!

I love the entire room. Ideally I'd buy the whole set...but of course I live in a world with a budget! I showed the picture to friends and my husband to get their feed back and a vote of confidence that I could actually do something like this. Well deperate times (aka: sick kid, unable to get out of the house) call for extreme measures.

I took this blank wall (excuse the window reflection) and hand drew a tree form using the picture above as a rough guide.

I used brown acrylic paints from a craft store to paint the tree form on the wall. This was the point where I knew... NO TURNING BACK.... like it or hate it it was staying! :) I am no artist... so this was a huge risk for me.

Of course no craft project in my house of three kids under 4 turns out just as I plan.... while out prepping a template for leaves my 2 1/2 year old twins decided to help me out with the paint job. Imagine my horror (and delight) to find they had painted the wall ... but DIDN'T come close to the tree!

I used a template to start painting leaves on the branches.

Then I added flowers in varying shades of pink and red and added lighter colors to accent and add dimension.

In the end it doesn't look much like the PBK version and it's by no means perfect... but I think it fills the space nicely. Eventually I may hang a bird cage on the right branch that looks a little funny... but we'll see if that ever happens.

Eventually I'll finish the REST of the room...

linked here:

Making the World Cuter

Keeping it Simple

The Girl Creative

Look What I Got!!!

So I have this wall in my living room that I've absolutely hated since we moved in. I just haven't known what to do with it. I've tried a few things here and there and it just wasn't working for me. Then I decided after seeing some beautiful secretaries out there in bloggy land that it was just what the wall needed. I searched at Round Top. I searched at Canton. I found a lot I loved... but the price tags made me gasp. I was not willing (or able) to spend $400-$500 on one of these babies. Enter CRAIGSLIST! I found this....

Now, I don't like the wharf design on it so that will get covered up (or opened so you can't see it). But I got this for $125 (and it has a lighted hutch). I couldn't believe that it was still available when I called the lady. I am pretty excited... but now I don't know what to do with it and here is where I need YOUR help!!! Do I paint it, do I stain it, do I leave it as is (and fold down the drop desk to hide the wharf?)?

Will you help me, pretty please?? I've got both black and stained furniture in the living room right now. My walls are cream colored. My gut is to go bold and do red with this piece. The sofa is leather, I have a greenish goldish chair that will be close by. If I was on the ball I'd show you pictures of my room... but that requires some advance planning and I just don't have motivation right now! :)

Halloween treats

For simple Halloween treats, I dipped apples and pretzels in caramel and chocolate candy melts and then added some nuts and sprinkles! Yum!

They are super easy & delicious!

Can I claim this as a healthy snack??

They're just apples right??