Trailer makeover-part 2-{up}recycling

I love to repurpose things! A good 'find' at value village (good samaritan or goodwill if we were back in TN) can really make my day. I love taking something old and unwanted and turning it into something new. Doing that is not so easy here. There is no shopping at all... No grocery stores, no gas station, and no value village. So I rummaged through all the school rooms, the attic, the kitchen, and our shed thing and here is what I came up with.

In the next 2 photos:

1. metal canning jar lids (from jars that were being used for other things and no longer needed their lids) covered in an adorable rain drop fabric (given to me by my sweet friend Sallee)

2. clouds made from this template out of art/scratch foam (from the buried art supplies in the school)

3. a metal cooling rack (we had 3 and I only use two at a time at most)

4. 2 sheets of wood something (found in the buried at supplies at school) painted with chalk board paint (I purchased this last time we were in fairbanks for a project with the kids)

5. a tiny cookie sheet (found in the pre-school room) and a normal size cookie sheet (found covered in gunk and all banged up); I scrubbed and spray painted the big one... It was painted much nicer on the other side but it didn't want to hang right facing that direction so I will have to paint the backside again soon.

6. Harry Potter, Princess Bride, and Fairy Tale magnet sets all purchased from etsy here

This dummy doorknob didn't work out in the bedroom door so I screwed it into the bathroom wall. It now serves as a towel hanger. (side note: this is what the wallpaper looked like in the kitchen. ew right!?)

I found this wood frame thing in the attic at school. I hot glued the colored burlap fabric to the back so I could hang earrings. I also hot glued two craft dowels to the front... one up high for necklaces and one down low for bracelets. The hat I wear most often hangs nicely on the corner.

Rainbow party

For our 6 year old! Because I have too many photos (I am having a terrible time choosing) to add to her 6 yr bday post I am making this one separate. A rainbow birthday party deserves it's own post.
At her request we decided to have a rainbow party this year. Just us. A whole day marathon. We made pink pancakes for breakfast, decorated with our rainbow drawings, napped (still have one semi sick kido), made a rainbow layer cake, and dyed play silks! I even wrapped her birthday gift in the colors of the rainbow. That was a HUGE hit :)
Here are the photos...

Woooo HAPPY Bert-day!

Add food coloring to your 'funfetti' cake mix

Grease your pan

Cook your colors one at a time

Wash your dishes

The round pan didn't work... had to use a smaller rectangle 

RAINBOW CAKE!!!

Attempting to blow out the candle. She had a rough go with it. Apparently this face was going to help. LOL!

Sisters {love}

dying the play silks... more finished photos of that later... they went to bed with them.

Halloween Party

Photo booth fun! We used print outs from here, Martha Stewart online, and some I made myself. Print them out and place on sticky back foam sheets. Then, cut them out using an xacto knife. Lastly, hot glue a wooden dowel to the back of each piece. Now, take ridiculous photos with your family and friends!

Haha! She was just doing what she thought everyone else was doing! Hold it to your face and say CHEESE!

Family photo... with a unibrow baby!

SUGGGGAARRR!

The group of littles -1

She actually popped one of them!

Sugar Crash the morning after

I wish I had taken the time to take better photos of the kids in their costumes, but the truth is I didn't have time. Joe and I had help from no one during the party (some of the kids did help set up Friday), so we got snacks and drinks for everyone, held costume contests, kept the music going, and manned every game. I think everyone had a blast, but we were exhausted. Looking back on the photos, though, I wish I had snapped more pics of my kids in costume! They were seriously the MOST ADORABLE kids ever!

In the 0-4 category there was Arwen owl, Molly chicken, an Indian (not pictured), a frog, and a race car driver. Everyone got the same prize because there was only 5 of them and I thought it would be unfair to hand cash to 3. I also went and found a stack of books I had just ordered for the preschool and handed those out. Each kid got $5 and 'A House for Hermit Crab' by Eric Carle. LOVE HIM!

In the 5-13 group we had Macy the octopus (1st place $25), a zombie thing (2nd place $15), a witch/zombie (2nd place $15), a skeleton (3rd place $10), and Gavin the soldier. Gavin was a sport when he realized he didn't win! He did voice later that he was sure he had won because he and Macy were the only ones to wear their costumes the whole night. The others only wore theirs for the judging.

In the adult group there was a cat princess fairy thing (1st $30), me the spaceman (2nd $15), Cleopatra (3rd $10), Joe- the Phantom of the Opera.

We had lots of games... ringtoss, pinata, slime pit relay, balloon pop darts, fishing for prizes, and bubble gum blowpop contest. Each had candy and toy prizes!

We also had popcorn, apple juice, coffee, pumpkin pie, and cupcakes as snacks for our guests.

It was a ridiculously fun and busy night! Enjoying the peace of this weekend... nothing other than cleaning and laundry :)

3 down...

1 to go!

Chicken. Complete!

Octopus. Done!

Owl. FINISHED!

Toy Solider... um... so the spray paint didn't make it on the flight the day Joe came in because there was nobody at the airport that could deal with hazmat... sooo we forgot about it and don't know if we will be able to paint Gavin's suit now. He may just be a soldier instead of a Toy Solider (you know, like the guys from toy story). Shoot! <--- seems to be a word I use often these days.

Here is a sneak peak of our owlet.

You don't get one of the octopus because I finished that one yesterday and packed it away before I thought to get a photo of Macy wearing it.

1 1/2 down...

...2 1/2 to go.

Octopus. 1/2 finished.

Chicken. Complete!

Here is a sneak peek for ya ;)

Some things

Just a few things to share...

I am making a Birthday Banner for the party and thought I would share how I did it.

-Cut 14 5"x5" squares out of scrap fabric

I found 3 yards of wide bias tape to connect them all together.

-Pin the top part of each square into the bias tape

-sew it along the top

-I am going to paint the HAPPY BIRTHDAY letters on the squares as soon as the baby wakes up, and I can get to my paint and brushes. But, you may have to wait until the party pictures to see the banner in action :)

The teacup fairy houses are coming along so much nicer than I thought. I was so worried the grass would never grow. Here is where I got the original idea. She used the teacups as pretty little place cards, but I am using them as fairy homes. Now that the grass is growing, I just need to make the fairy babies I have been attempting (see previous posts with weird pictures hahaha), and collect sticks, bark, acorns, leaves, and such for the littles to 'decorate' them with.

Here's a few pics of them... I hope to do a how-to/tutorial for the banner and teacups (with much better photos!) after things settle down some... if they settle down ;)

I ALSO made an imperfect table cover... I didn't think I would get it done today but the kids were wonderful and Arwen took a nice long nap! I used 18x22 inch rectangles out of some quilting packs my Ma had given me and cut the rest from scraps I was handed down. The trim took the longest... I made it myself. Not a hard thing to do but it is SO time consuming.

Here's a few pics. If you want to make one too, I can help. Just ask... no time for a tutorial right now... hopefully soon :) Please forgive the mess. I haven't cleaned in a bit, there is laundry to be done, and the kids have trashed the place. If I had a picnic table, I'd place it nicely on there and take beautiful pictures outside. I don't, so the living room/playroom floor has to do for now.

Homemade Vanilla

I've been making vanilla and decided to document the color process each week... until we started eating it. As you can see in the first picture, some of this deliciousness is missing! So here it is in backwards order.

4 weeks old

3 Weeks old

2 weeks old

1 Week old

Birth/Day 1

Have you ever read the ingredients in your vanilla? Go, right now, and read them. The only thing that should be in that bottle is vanilla beans and alcohol. Unless you have spent the extra $13 or so for the 'fancy bottle' (it was costing us about $15 a bottle) it probably has some extra ingredients. I make an awful lot with vanilla so I have decided to take care of this issue and make my own!

Few fun facts about vanilla:

*McCormick Pure Vanilla Extract contains...

Vanilla Bean Extractives In Water, Alcohol (35%), and Corn Syrup.

(hum I thought it was PURE VANILLA?!)

*The FDA requires that the solution contain a minimum of 35% alcohol and 13.35 ounces of vanilla bean per gallon (so most companies only use the minimum... then mix it with whatever crap is cheap... water, corn syrup, or sugar)

*Imitation vanilla extract is usually made by soaking alcohol into wood, which contains vanillin. Vanillin is chemically treated to mimic the taste of vanilla.

*My vanilla is made with 40% alcohol Vodka and vanilla beans... only

*For 1/2 lb Madagascar Bourbon vanilla beans I paid $20.79 and got 10 Tahitian vanilla beans free. That is approximately 80-90 beans. I use 6 beans in 350 ml (or 12.68 oz). If you add the price of cheap vodka (like absolut) it is much cheaper than the real pure vanilla in a grocery store and now I know exactly what is in my vanilla. That alone is priceless in my opinion.

Traveling from home

Last week we tried Ethiopian food for the first time... I made it myself. I was unsure at first. But once it started cooking and those smells started to rise from the pots I knew it was going to be a hit! I almost never follow a recipe exactly so that could be why it was so delicious... it was Alice-ified. Here was the menu for the night...

Injera (this is the bread 'plate') with Amhari Mesir Wat (this is a red lentil dish) and Yekik Alicha (Ethiopian Split Peas) I also made Niter Kibbeh (Ethiopian Spiced Butter) for cooking the dishes above and found I like to sautee onions and mushrooms in this for my 'normal' everyday cooking. You wouldn't believe how filling this was! It was so cheap to make and we all (minus Molly... she never eats) went to bed with nice full tummies. A+ in my book!

Sorry the pictures aren't the best... it was the best I could do with the lighting I had... nothing creative.

Sometime this week... maybe tonight... we are going to Mexico for some homemade Tamales!

Little Loves in action

Miss Behaving... I mean Molly!

Miss Macy... aka can't hold still