feather her nest. {baby shower}

One of my favorite things to do is host. I love being in my element and having others over to relax and eat. When we were house hunting at this time last year, that was high on our priority, a place to be able to have a lot of people over.

A few weekends ago, I was able to host a baby shower for a good friend. It was for her third baby, but her first boy. And I say, baby shower's aren't just for the first baby, it's to celebrate life, a life joining a family, and to make the mama feel special!

My theme was inspired by a Pinterest idea--to make quill pens with gold tips. I knew I wanted a feather theme. The hubs helped design the invitations, he's so talented and handy.

I went with gold and teal colors, which made it easy, since teal is a color I regularly decorate with.

I bought the paper straws from Target, along with the square plates.

I bought quill feathers from Michael's Craft Store, washi tape from Target, and ink refills from Staples. All I did was cut off the extra part of the ink refills, stuck it in the feather, then wrapped washi tape around it and glued the end of the tape on to make sure it stayed in place. Washi tape isn't very sticky, but it's super cute. I brushed the tips with gold paint. These became useful for the game we played and they were the favors to take home!

We played two games. One was the typical "you can't say baby" game or your pin gets taken away. But to make it a wee bit more challenging I also said you couldn't say the mama's name. I bought clothespins at the Dollar Tree for this game and used an ink pad to add teal and then a circle stamp to add gold paint. Oh, I also used these clothespins to hang "James" up, which the letters were made from pipe cleaners, but I forgot to snap a picture of it.

The other game I found on Pinterest and it was a free printout! The placemats with the feathers on it came from Target clearance right after Christmas.

Trying to be frugal, I reused aluminum cans by painting them and using them for decor. These was so easy, and cute! Not to mention, I can use these over and over for other parties or every day.

My favorite thing was probably the cake. Mainly because the icing, oh my goodness, so delish! I was inspired by a cake on Pinterest that was teal with gold edible sparkles. You read that right, I found some edible gold and teal dust from Michael's Craft Store. The icing recipe can be found here. 

And here is the lady of the hour, herself, April: 

I had close lady friends of April bring some food to help. It was all so good. A great Saturday morning, celebrating the beautiful pregnant mama! 

diy birthday gift for the kiddos.

I have a love-hate relationship with Pinterest. There are some pretty things are there that inspire me by words, or in decorating my home, or what to cook. It's been handy to find a craft for the kiddos to do. But sometimes I get rather overwhelmed and the "am I doing enough?" feeling comes into play. That's when I close it up and stay off Pinterest for a couple of days.

Recently, though, I have opened it back up to find some yummy recipes and great activities for the girls. One of the easiest and fun things to do is make homemade play-dough using this recipe. The girls enjoy the mixing then of course the playing right afterwards. Yesterday we made a double batch so we could give some as a gift for my nephew who turned four.

To store the play dough in, I bought some small mason jars and took to another Pinterest idea. [Although I never actually pinned the idea.] I had everything else I needed---super glue, little plastic animals, and spray paint. I super glued the animals onto the lids, let it dry overnight and the next day put a couple of coats of spray paint on the lids.

And ta-dah!

The little gift turned out like this:

Pretty cute, huh? I'm thinking this might become the year of play-dough and cute containers for gift-giving. 

painting a canvas for baby brother.

For about two months now, I have been wanting to do a little art project with the girls that involved them creating something for Lincoln's room. [He doesn't actually have a room yet. Ha!] I found a project on Pinterest and it caught my eye. Finally, today I got up some motivation and did the project with the girls. It's really easy, fun, and turned out great.

You need a blank canvas, painter's tape, paint, paint brushes (I used sponge brushes) and some type of letter cut-outs. I found my letters at Hobby Lobby, they feel like post-it notes. I glued the letters on lightly with some of the kids stick glue.

First, I glued the letters onto the canvas. I was nervous about glueing them on, but I needed them to stick through the painting. I did it pretty lightly, but enough for them to stick. Then I used the painter's tape to create the "chevron" design.

Then I let the girls go at it with painting. The colors were orange, grey, and turquoise-blue.  (They were only in smocks and underpants. Easy clean up. Also, it was a windy day, so we put rocks on the plates to keep them from blowing away.)

When the girls were finished, I immediately took off the letters and tape. I didn't want the letters to dry too much on there since I glued them down. They came off fairly easily. Then I let it dry. 

And ta-da! It's far from perfect. I didn't measure and do exact taping or anything. I but I love the handmade look to it. The girls were awfully proud of the painting too. 

Lincoln has some creative sisters, ready to welcome him into our family!