Baby Shower

About a month ago Kelsey and I threw one of our dear friends Darcy a baby shower. She is having a girl (who is actually here now!) and we are so excited for her. So when we were thinking about a theme for this precious little girl, we thought of that classic saying, "Sugar and spice and everything nice, thats what little girls are made of". So we ran with it, but kept the color scheme pastel yet not overly pink.

We decided to use some cute onesies and clothes to decorate along with tissue paper poms, flowers and tassels. All of them were pretty simple to make. 

We decided to hang some pom poms above the comfiest chair for the Mom-to-Be to sit in while opening gifts.

The first game of the afternoon was the classic "Don't Say Baby" game.

We also used poms, paper lanterns and crepe paper to decorate the food table. We didn't have a table cloth, but had some tulle that we ended up not using so we used that to cover the table.

A few highlights food wise were the chorizo stuffed bacon wrapped dates and the compound butters. I know that I have posted about the dates before. I promise a recipe is coming soon and is supper simple. The compound butters are also really easy. I made strawberry, smoked paprika and roasted garlic and basil compound butters. You could really add almost any flavor that you like to high quality butter.

I made some funfetti cake pops and drizzled them in pink candy melts. Also I made a red velvet cake with cream cheese filling. I attempted a cream cheese swiss meringue buttercream. I used a ruffle technique to decorate the cake. However, the cream cheese SMB didn't quite turn out and wasn't as stiff as I would have liked. Live and learn and try again! 

We repurposed a fabric bunting that I had made for Valentine's Day to decorate the table for gifts. We also used a cute outfit to decorate. Those do double duty as decorations and as a gift to Momma! 

 

This is Kelsey who is a sweet dear friend and I was so happy to be able to host a shower for Darcy together! 

The most involved game we played was called tinkle in the pot. A lot of the women were hesitant at first, but ended up having fun and laughing throughout the game. 

How to play: Split the group into two or three teams. For each team have a balloon, ping pong ball and bowl or mason jar. The game will be a relay and the goal is to drop the ping pong ball in the bowl or mason jar. Have players put the balloon under their shirt or hold it up to their belly. Place the ping pong ball between their knees. They must wobble from the starting line down to the bowl and then drop the ping pong ball in the bowl. We ended up letting people go back after 5 attempts. First team to have everyone drop the ball in the bowl wins!

The prizes for the tinkle game were painted candles. These were a budget friendly and easy DIY.

Darcy was such a cute pregnant lady!

We gave people seeds for herbs and peppers for favors so they could add some "spice" to their lives. Yes. So puny, but I love it.

So glad we were able to throw a shower for Darcy!

Isley Katherine was born a week and a half ago and she is such a precious little girl! I am so looking forward to watching Isley Kate grow up!

Thanks for reading and I hope it might have been able to give you some inspiration :)

Painting and Wine Tasting

I'm really excited to share a couple of projects I have been working on lately! I am not an artist so I was a little nervous to take on painting, but these projects are ones that even non-artists can do. The first project is one that I am planning on hanging in the kitchen.

I am really happy with how they came out and they were fairly easy. If you have the patience to trace the state outline and then paint in the lines, then you can make these!

This is the second project I have been working on. I had a custom a wall vinyl of Romans 12:12 that I am going to place over the painting once I am happy with it. It isn't quite done yet and is waiting for me to put the finishing touches on. Eventually it is going to hang above our bed.

Yesterday we went out to Arrington Vineyards to taste their wines and have a little picnic. Their grounds were very nice and had many picnic tables for people to use. I have to say though, we were underwhelmed by their wines. Also at the tasting bar it seemed like they were just trying to pour quickly and get the groups done as fast as they could rather than engage the people who are tasting. However, Gavin and my expectations were fairly low going in and they were met. I don't think we would take people who are visiting out there unless they really wanted to go to a winery.

In other news we bought Gavin a guitar!! He is loving having a guitar in the house again and I am loving listening to him play.

Thanks for reading!

Adorning Our Front Door

For a while I have had a wreath for the front door on my list of DIY projects to do and I finally got around to making one! When I decided to take on making a wreath I searched for some tutorials and didn't really find any. So, I thought I would just post a little tutorial of how I made my wreath.

Materials:

Grape Vine Wreath

Fake Flowers

Wire Clippers

Thin Floral Wire

Thick (18 gauge) Floral Wire

Glue Gun

Unfinished Wooden Letter

Coordinating Paint and Paintbrush

First cut the stems off of the flowers, but leave about two inches at the base of the flower. Next, wrap the thin floral wire around the base of the flowers. I also put a glob of hot glue over the wire just as an extra precaution and for a sturdier hold. Make sure to leave plenty of wire because that is how the flowers will attach to the wreath. I decided to attach the flowers with wire instead of only hot glue so that the flowers could be easily removed in the future to change the look of the wreath.

The next step is to arrange all of your elements on your wreath until you are happy with how it looks. Once you are happy with the layout of everything take the thin wires that are attached to the flowers and thread them through the grape vine wreath. It is important to not just go around the wreath, but through it so that the wires are well hidden. Then just twist the wires together on the back side of the wreath. Make sure that the wires are twisted tight enough and the flowers are securely held onto the wreath.

Finally, paint your letter in the color you had chosen and let dry. To attach the letter I used two thick floral wires attached to the back. I attached the wires to the letter by taking fabric I had laying around, which happened to be burlap, and hot gluing the fabric to the letter with the wire underneath. Once everything is dry put the wire through the wreath like with the flowers and secure by twisting in the back.

This is my completed wreath as-is. I am still contemplating if I want to add anymore greenery to it. I hope you give making your own wreath a go! It was a fun project and now I have a cute wreath to put on our front door!

***UPDATE***

I ended up adding some more greenery, so I thought I would post a picture of my final project. I used the same method to attach the greenery that I used for the flowers. I think the greenery is just the little extra that the wreath needed. I love that it can be up almost year round!

Thanks for reading!

So it's been a while

Well, the holidays happened and posting got put on the back burner, the way back there back burner. So I figured I would do a really quick recap of the last few months.

For Thanksgiving we went down to Atlanta to visit Gavin's Aunt and Uncles. I had never met them or their children (Gavin's cousins) and it was great to be able to meet them and spend some time with new family. Since we both had to work the day after Thanksgiving we were only able to spend a day down there. I hope that we are able to go back down and explore more of Atlanta in the future!

Between Thanksgiving and Christmas Gavin and I were both working a lot and getting settled at the apartment. We got (mostly) everything unpacked by the time my parents came out for Christmas. My parents came out for Christmas and we got to explore more of Nashville with them. Here are some picture highlights from their visit:

 Gavin carved the turkey for Christmas dinner!

 We used our china for the first time!

 We visited Opryland at night to enjoy the lights

They had horse drawn carriages that took you around the grounds! 

 

Some of the trees all lit up

We went to a barbeque restaurant that was on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. It was soo good!

We went downtown with my parents and checked out some of the honkeytonks!

 At Honkeytonk Central, this place is three stories and has a different band on each floor

 We toured the Ryman auditorium and even did the backstage tour!

Those were some of the fun things we did while my parents were here, but there is still so much more of Nashville to explore! My parents stayed through New Years and we spent New Years Eve downtown. They closed off Broadway Street downtown and had a stage at the end of the street by the river. There were multiple artists that performed and The Fray played the last concert at midnight!

The stage and the music note that dropped at midnight

It was cold and started raining around midnight.

My parents flew home after New Years and Gavin and I got back into the normal swing of things. I am still working at Hobby Lobby and starting to work some Saturdays in the office. Gavin passed his Series 6 test before Christmas and just finished a 2 week program they call product training. He is now on the phone with advisors who are calling with questions and is studying for his Series 63 licensing test. Once he passes that test he is eligible to interview for Internal Wholesaler positions within Jackson and will only have one test left to take! Meanwhile, I have started looking into Master's Programs and taken the beginning steps toward studying for the GRE.

I have been enjoying putting my spare time towards crafting and trying new recipes. These are a few projects I have done in the last week or so:

Valentine's Day Wreath

I made this with crayons and my blow dryer

I am loving all the wine cork crafts that are all over pinterest! They are so inspiring!

My next project is painting a desk we got off of Craigslist. It is going to be my craft desk and storage area. After that I have our table and chairs and then a pair of side tables to paint. I am excited to take on this project and a little nervous at the same time. I have yet to attempt to paint furniture in my DIY projects.

On another front, Gavin and I found a Church that we have gone back to and even want to continue to go back to. I did not think that it would be so challenging to find a church in the "belt buckle of the Bible Belt". So far the people have been very friendly and welcoming, the worship has been good and the preaching is solid. The first week we were there we found our the preacher and his wife are from California and his wife even went to Cal Poly. Also last week we found out that there are some big Duck fans that attend the church. I guess it just made it feel like we could relate that much more. It isn't that those things are necessities, but they just make us feel a little more at home.

Well, I think that is all for now! I really am going to try to update more often! The posts might not be as long or as in depth, but I figure more frequent posts are worth it.