Ten on Ten :: November 2013 :: A Full Harvest

We had such a fun day today - a full harvest indeed! This morning we accompanied Chris to a little Church out in Issaquah and listened to him speak about all that God is doing at the Union Gospel Mission. This afternoon was spent celebrating our Levi's sixth birthday and his cousin Wesley's fifth birthday too at a Harry Potter themed party with lots of family and friends...great grandma is modeling the fun witch hats Jenny made for the festivities in this last shot and it's definitely a favorite capture for me today!! I have already seen a few sets from the linky and on Instagram too and can tell you there are some amazing photos - a few of them made me teary eyed I can't wait to see what else you guys found. Thank you so much to all who played along with me today I will be looking through all of them and choosing a favorite from the full harvest prompt soon, the linky will be open for the rest of the week so feel free to add your set whenever you get a chance! xoxo

Books and Bow-Ties for Baby Ben

My best friend Claire is due to have her first baby pretty much any day now. I am so so excited to meet her little boy, we have been dreaming about being Mom's together since high-school! I am sure I will be a puddle of emotions when I get to lay eyes on little Benjamin and his beautiful Mama glowing as she always does with such light and joy. I had the honor of hosting an intimate shower for her last weekend along with some help from friends Laura and Jenny and my MIL Paula and Step Mom Julia too who both jumped in and saved the day with kiddos and food prep and decorating while Chris was out of town for work!

We did a soft bow-tie and book theme and the weather was truly gorgeous. Laura brought yummy food and Jenny put together two adorable book themed cocktail/mocktails for the day. I made miniature ice cream cakes in jars and there were such sweet women who brought such thoughtful gifts and conversation it was really wonderful My little Josie Joan-Claire (named for her Auntie) was in attendance too helping serve coffee and open gifts, she was in heaven with all the ladies!

Thank you to all who helped pull off such a fun and special afternoon. I love you Claire more than life, we have walked many many seasons together and this next one I can tell is going to be so much fun!!

make something monday :: chocolate covered cherry bombs

Over the Fourth of July the boys and I came up with these "cherry bombs" cleverly named for the holiday and the smoke bombs Dad was playing with. We wanted something fun, festive and easy and dairy and egg free to share at the BBQ. I realize that chocolate covered cherries is not a new idea and it doesn't really take rocket science to figure out how to achieve this yummy treat but I have made them a few times since and feel like I need to celebrate even the most simple creative moments during this crazy season I am in. They always turn out so cute and are perfect to make with the kids so I thought I would share with you a few little tips to make these cuties.

First of all you don't need anything fancy. Just cherries, chocolate chips and sprinkles. We have tried out a few different kinds of sprinkles and decided that the ones up top, the tiny little round balls look the best but these ones here taste better...not so crunchy.

All you really need to do is wash and dry the cherries and melt about half a bag of the chips in a double boiler over low on the stove. A little chocolate goes a long way with these but you will need a lot of sprinkles so make sure to buy extra of those.

Line a baking sheet with parchment and then get to work dipping the cherries into the warm chocolate and then immediately into the sprinkles. I dip all the cherries with the stems and set aside the ones without to roll in the extra chocolate at the end. Those end up in a separate parchment lined dish as the reject bin...the best ones right :).

Pop them in the fridge for a bit to set up and then share at your next party. They look super cute on top of a sundae as well!

Hope you all have a wonderful Monday!

make something monday :: pinterest party

By now I am sure that most of you guys are pretty familiar with Pinterest. If you are not than stop reading and head immediately over HERE and get acquainted with the phenomenon that is pinning favorite images, crafts, recipes really anything you would put on an inspiration board that you find around the web virtually knowing that you will be able to find it again...and you can see what your friends are pinning too! It is the best kind of addiction and I am sure many of you are just as hooked as I am!

My sister in law Jenny is also pretty in love with Pinterest and when she called me a few weeks ago with the brilliant idea to throw a Pinterest Party I was super excited to see what she would come up with. It was so much fun and really the perfect little party to host yourself this holiday season so Jenny was excited to let me share all about it here in hopes that you might want to throw one too!

First things first she sent out an evite to all of her friends (in real life) who are users of Pinterest. After we accepted she created a shared pin board that all of us would be able to use to pin the projects we were thinking of bringing. Jenny asked that each of us would choose a favorite project found via Pinterest or a favorite recipe - this is a tiny sampling of what everyone brought. Check out the full board HERE!

When we arrived there were stations ready for each of us to set up our projects. We were instructed to bring enough to make four of the craft we chose one for yourself and then for three others. Then we all got to draw two projects from a hat (three if you brought a food item) that way it was a lottery choosing who got to do what. We could trade if there was something we really had our eye on and a lot of us brought enough supplies to do some extra so it seemed like everyone there was really excited and happy with what they got to make!

Jenny also provided the supplies for everyone to make and take home one of these t-shirt scarves it was sort of like Christmas to be honest :).

 Our pin board on the big screen for all of us to access if need be.

I brought fabric wrapped bangles - a fun and easy diy!

Amazing feather earring demonstration.

A personal favorite project, the yarn wrapped jars and bottles. So festive and easy!!


And all the while we got to snack on yummy treats like the chubby hubby bars, mini pizzas, chicken tortilla soup, bread pudding...everything was wonderful!

It was such a blessing to be with so many wonderful, creative, generous women yesterday. Such a nice little break from the craziness that is my day to day reality with three wild kids. I left with special treasures I had created with friends, a full heart and tons more inspiration to get me into the holiday mood.  Thanks Jenny!

So what about you have you been to a Pinterest Party yet? Do you think you would consider throwing one yourself? Leave any questions for Jenny or myself in the comment section!

Have a wonderful Monday friends...and I WILL be back with my Ten on Ten favorites too I promise. Just so much good stuff to see but I am almost done!

xoxo

Snapshots from Halloween

Just a couple of peeks from the "BOOthday" party we hosted last night to celebrate little Josie and Levi's first and fourth birthdays. It was a blur of frosting and candy and coffee to keep me going. I didn't get a ton of photos but we had a really great time!

Our kids went for a Star Wars theme this year, Levi as Darth Vader, Simon as Luke Skywalker and Josie as Princess Leia. We felt so blessed to have our close friends and family around to celebrate and even though Chris and I realized after we left the house with a ton of kids to trick or treat that neither of our kids were wearing shoes (um where were their parents? :)) we ended the night in a candy coma with happy hearts.

I asked Levi this morning how he felt about his party and this is what he said "when I was there my life was feeling really great!" ha - I loved that response and I couldn't agree more. Looking forward to next years party already!!

And now onto November...the holidays are here!!!