Our Deck Renovation

Since my hand is out of commission and I don't enjoy the chicken pecking, I figured I would post a picture gallery of the before and after of our latest deck renovation project.

The deck was one of the selling features in our home but definitely needed a face lift. Some of the top boards were rotted and ready to put a foot through. We started by replacing those boards and were relieved to find a perfectly nice deck foundation.

I do have a funny story about when we power washed our deck

,

both a flood and a fire in one day! I will leave that for next time:)

 This was a weekend in itself!

 Sand off the peeling paint.

 Switched out our flood lights for these babies! The motion sensor was so off and would drive me nuts. Yes, it lacks a bit of security but I'm not a fan of flood lights.

 Two coats of a chocolate solid stain and a pinto white solid stain.

It took us a total of 3 weekends... including the weekend of flood and fire, which was kind of a wash.

What do ya think?

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Tangled Party Cupcake Tower

Last week, I posted my daughters 5th Tangled birthday party! I have gotten several emails on the cupcake tower and thought I would explain in more detail how I created this feature.

Materials used....

Bird house from Michael's

Pringles Can

Serving Platter

Acrylic paint

I first decorated the bird house to resemble tower from the movie. I used purple and blue paints for the roof. I used tan and brown for the sides of the tower. I created the vines effect and flowers. This adds a little dimension to the house that was missing before.

I used a Pringles can for the tower. First, I coated with a base in medium gray. Then I took a thick brush and filled in the bricks with both darker and lighter tones of gray.

To assemble, I flipped the can over and used a hot glue gun to attach the house to the bottom of the Pringles can.

Then I placed the open end of the can over the serving platter handle.

You're done!! 

You can add a braid,

which is absolutely adorable,

to hang out of the peep hole in the bird house, like I did above. I just used yellow yarn. This is a great way to add a personalized touch to a party with out spending a whole lot of money.

 Cost Break down:

• Birdhouse: $4.99 @ Michael's
• Ikea serving platter: $14.99
• Pingles can: $1
• Acrylic Paint: $1/color = $8

Total cost was  $29.00

The best part, you get to use the serving platter for future parties!

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Hawaiian Pretend Cafe Printable Play Menu

My girls love to play pretend. They have an amazing assortment of kitchen accessories and love to play restaurant. They are always using random books or notepads as menu's and I though it would be fun to create a customized menu for them!

My kids have a wonderful imagination and I'm always looking for ways to encourage that! This is one of many different accessories I've created for them. You can easily print out a couple of these and have them laminated, to make if feel like the real deal:).

You can download you own printable play menu for free! Click 

Lilo's Cafe Menu

.

DIY Laundry Detergent

I'm always looking for ways to save money and go a more Eco friendly route with home products. After some research and a little experimenting, I made my very own laundry detergent that works great and is lighter on the wallet! You can also add some essential oil to this recipe to give it a custom scent. I suggest rosemary, lavender or eucalyptus.

Supplies

5 cups of Borax

5 cups of Washing Soda

1 Medium box of Baking soda

I small container of Oxy Clean

1 bar of Fels Naptha Laundry Bar

Grate the bar of laundry bar soap. Combine all and your ready to go.

I use 1 scoop for regular loads and 2 for larger or heavy dirt loads.

Display Wedding Memories with a Shadow Box

I was looking for ways to display some of my things from my wedding. I wanted to use our invitation, program and some dried flowers from my bouquet. I found this deep shadow box at a home goods store for 15 bucks! Here's what I was able to design....

I used my pins from the bouquet to stabilize the stationary. I hot glued the dried flowers after careful dissembling of the bouquet and rearranging them. Key word here is

careful

! These are delicate dried flowers that can snap easily!

Whats great about this idea is that you can use anything from any special event. If you want to use a bridal handkerchief, jewelery, special notes and photographs, the options are limitless! What are some of your ideas for keeping and displaying those memorable events?

DIY: Refurbished Kids Cottage

Have you seen that thing on Pinterest, with the DIY of the Little Tykes kid cottage? Well, I tried it! 

I used

Krylon Fusion for Plastic

 in red, white and brown. 

What I used....

3 cans of white

2 cans of red

2 cans of brown.

Here's what I did....

1. Dissembled the house. I took off the door and shutters.
2. Power wash both sides of all pieces of the play house and allow to air dry
3. Use a drop cloth or a large piece of cardboard under to protect the grass or drive way from the spray paint.
4. Evenly spray coordinating pieces with the color you choose. Allow to dry for at least 45 minutes.
7. Turn over the play house pieces and spray paint the opposite side as well as the sides.
8. Allow all pieces to dry over night to avoid chipping when you put the house back together.

Tip: Do this outside and on a day that is

NOT WINDY

or you will go through too many cans of spray paint!

Also, I only did the outside of the house in white. Since the inside was a faded yellow, I didn't really notice that much of a difference and it saved me time and money!

How did it really go?.....

I spent about 40 dollars on spray paint and from a distance this actually looks pretty cute. When I started to put the house back together, some of the red paint, on the doors and shutters,  smeared with the white pieces. It makes it look a little cheap but my girls really enjoyed it.

I spent all total of 5 hours and a sunny afternoon. For the time and the money, I probably wouldn't do this again. It was a free garbage picked playhouse that needed a little face lift.

Here is what it used to look like....

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Pinterest

!!!

Father's Day Frame

*This is a recycled post from last year! I wanted to share will you all again. 

What are your plans for your special Dad? 

Please share your ideas(because I have to find something to top this idea for this year)!!!

This year for Father's day I wanted to create something special. I went to Michael's and bought these wooden letters D and A... Then I thought get a P and you can do papa too. I took portraits of my little ones with the letters and here is what happened...

I took the picture and turned it black and white with Photoshop. I had to increase the brightness and contrast so it didn't look too dark.

I did this with each letter D, A, D.

The finished product for Dad.... 

Sorry for the picture quality... taken with a phone camera:(

I also did one for my pop. I used the letters PAPA... That's what my daughter calls him:)

I put the pictures on publisher and arranged them so I could print out one big 8x10.

Neverland - Tinkerbell Party and Marshmallow Fondant!

Oh my gosh!!! Did you know that you can melt marshmallow? Did you know that when you mix it with powdered sugar it forms a dough like frosting... similar to how you would kneed pizza dough?!?!? I think I have found the easiest thing yet to decorate my birthday cakes and I am super excited to share with you!

What you need

A bag of mini marshmallows

food coloring or frosting coloring

powdered sugar

This recipe is pretty simple. I took half a bag of the mini marshmallows  sprinkled with some water to coat and tossed. Then I microwaved the bowl for two sets of 45 seconds, stirring in between.

I added a cup of powdered sugar to the mix and then poured in out on a bed of powdered sugar.

This gets messy!!!! 

Note:

I recommend adding in the frosting coloring while it's in the liquid stage. I didn't do this the first time and I wasn't fun!

 I'm sorry for some of the blurry photos. the Hubby was on camera duty!!

This is the Tinkerbell Cake that I created from the Wilton Doll pan.

 I created this Pixie Hollow sign from Dollar Tree flowers, foam letters and wreath!! This is now hanging in her room over her bed! I love reusing party decorations!

 The flower pot was also created with materials from the Dollar Tree. I made three of them and placed them through out the party as center pieces!

Party favors include a pirate theme for the boy's (hook, tatoos, lost boys treasure) and a fairy spa theme for the girls (pixie dust, mini nail polish, mini nail kit, fairy rings). Everyone went home with their own Peter Pan story book!

 I had Bella help me with painting the treasure chest!! I found this one at Michael's for $15.

 I really wanted to create a pirate ship carved out of watermelon .. but they are not in season this time of year. So I created this pirate fruit bowl with a sail.

 Bella couldn't wait to try out her new bike.

And after the guests left.... They had to put blocks on the pedals because her legs are too short!!

DIY TinkerBell Invitations

Well if you couldn't have already guessed it.... Bella's birthday party theme is....

Tinkerbell and a Neverland Party!!!

Peter Pan is one of her favorite movies and I knew how much she would love a Tink party! I am generally not a person to purchase anything I can do myself. When it comes to invitations, I always like to create them myself. Microsoft Publisher is a great tool and I have managed navigate through it fairly easily. So I came up with this design! What do you think?

It was pretty easy to create and there are many free graphics out there if you know where to search. As long as your not selling and they are for personal use, you should be okay with using free graphics! The key is searching for a PNG graphic.

If any of you are interested in the FREE editable version email me!! I can send you my publisher file so you can make changes! Don't for get to show some love and subscribe!

More party ideas to come! Come back soon!

Hungry Caterpillar Invitations

I created these for a customer on my etsy shop called

3 Wittle Birds

!