Wordless Wednesday

(flamingo dominoes)

Good friends, Good food, Good fooling the kids!

 Since our husbands weren't home, my friend Klixi and I decided to entertain ourselves!  She and her three kids came over for dinner on Friday.  Only, we had dessert first.  Isn't this cake lovely?  The kids thought it was OK.  But they REALLY loved their dinner!  Those veggies and potatoes were gone in an instant and they were BEGGING for more!  How do I do it you ask?  Easy!  It's all in the presentation. 

Ha!  Ha!  OK, the cake is really two layers of meatloaf frosted in instant mashed potatoes and garnished with cherry tomatoes. 

The dinner menu ...
Fish Sticks = sugar wafer cookies spread with PB or hot fudge and rolled in Wheaties
Peas & Carrots = green Skittles, Laffy Taffy & Airheads rolled into balls, and orange Starbursts cut into squares
Mashed Potates & Gravy = vanilla ice cream and caramel sauce

We also added to the hilarity with solidified jello in the cups for the kids (so fun to watch them try to drink that!) and strawberry jelly disguised as ketchup!!!

And Klixi brought me this lovely bouquet for the table!

Thanks go out to Toni Peterson who first showed me the meatloaf cake idea and Disney's Family Fun site for the dinner/dessert idea!

20 minute apple crisp!

I am always looking for a quick and tasty dessert. Not for any particular reason other than I like eating them. I love this one because A) it's fast B) it's quasi-healthy and C) I don't have to wait for the oven to pre-heat!

So thanks to allrecipes.com for Microwave Apple Crisp

4 apples peeled cored and sliced
1/2 cup melted butter
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 cup quick cooking oats
1/2 cup flour
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. allspice

1. Spread the apples evenly in an 8 inch square glass baking dish. A deep dish glass pie plate will also work. In a medium bowl, mix together the melted butter, brown sugar, oats, flour, cinnamon and allspice. Sprinkle this topping evenly over the apples.
2. Cook on full power in the microwave for 10 to 12 minutes, until apples can easily be pierced with a knife. Enjoy!

It was tasty and fast. Sadly, it wasn't very crisp on top but if you wanted, I'm sure a minute or two under the broiler would solve that problem.

We love accessories!

Especially hair accessories.  However, my home is not equipped with many storage spaces and we were overtaxing the one closet we have to hold ALL of our bathroom stuff.  So here is the solution I came up with... lo and behold another project! 

 
I think she likes it!

New for Spring... if it ever comes!

I have two famous friends!  Laura Gunn has her own fabric line and she Patti Pinkston have their own pattern line!  This is the Baker Street bag in the Poppy Patterns line!  Isn't it stinkin' cute!It was fun to make... and then I added a little clutch for my chapstick, lotions, and other odds and ends from this tutorial (I made mine a bit smaller). 

I'm using my bag as a purse, but I've seen others use it as a church bag for their kiddos' coloring books.  It's a great size for piano books too!

What would you use this bag for?  And did you look at Laura's fabrics?  I love the poppy collection!  Oh the possibilities there!!!  The question is what WOULDN'T I make with it!

And on to the next costume!

As soon as I saw this dress ...I knew I wanted it!!!  It is from the new Alice in Wonderland as well.  It is when Alice grows huge and is in the Queen of Hearts' court.  They use the curtains to "clothe this enormous girl."

And thus began one of my more insane projects (and between you and me, that is saying something!)

I started with what I had.  I had a LOT of muslin and I realized that I could dye it for a few bucks.  I'd never done it before, but how hard could it be???  Well it wasn't extremely hard, but it was very time consuming as I had to sit there and stir it for 30 minutes (yeah, that doesn't sound long until you do it!)  That took care of getting the right colored UNDER-skirt.  Yeah, I know, you can't even see it.  In my defense, in the original plan in my head, you were going to see it, but plans change.  Luckily by this point I'd figured out my ruffle foot and whipping that skirt together wasn't too much of a headache.  But now we've come to the point in my saga where there was a REAL problem.  The over-dress.  Now the hunt began.  The hunt for The Perfect Fabric.  I soon (after several stores and many websites) realized that it really didn't exist, especially not in my price range (super cheap).  So I settled for some white mesh fabric and fabric paint!  I tried the spray fabric paint, but it was more expensive, I went through a whole can just on the bodice, and it bled more.  So, with a lot of masking tape, a foam brush and a lot of time I created my own stripey-ness!  And of course I added the little black hearts and white dots all over too!  Before I went all crazy with the painting I cut out my pieces so I wouldn't have to paint fabric that was just getting cut off.  I used a dress I had to make a pattern for the bodice and decided to do a circle skirt that I later sliced up the middle.  Then came the ruffles.  Oh the ruffles.  Yeah, I had to paint all those too.  I was getting really sick of painting stripes by this point!  Well, long story short (ha) I got the overdress made!  Yay!  Next came the poofy tulle skirt!  Let's just say there was so much tulle in my bonus room that it was sometimes hard to find me!  And P.S. you can't use a ruffle foot on tulle.  Grrrrrr.  So gather and gather and gather some more!  I then needed the rope belt (to complete the "curtains" look).  I found some piping cord that I already had, dyed it red, braided it to make a thicker cord, decided it wasn't red enough, painted it with Puffy Paint, made big tassels out of crochet thread, attached them and... BINGO!  An amazing rope belt.  Yes I know you are thinking I am totally insane.  It's true, I was thinking the same thing.  And here's the finished product...