Cupcake Wrappers

I've seen very cute things called cupcake wrappers lately. They're a great way to dress up cupcakes, but they're expensive. Seriously, $13 for a dozen? So I decided to get creative. To make your own cupcake wrappers you will need:

12" or larger paper doilies
pencil
scissors or craft knife
tape
cupcakes, homemade or store bought, as long as they're the normal 2" size.
wrapper template

Lay the template on the doily (can be on multiple doilies). Trace with pencil and cut out.

Wrap around cupcake and secure with tape.

Different heights.

A 12" doily will fit 3 wrappers if they are the smaller size, and two of the larger. I paid $2.50 for 8 doilies (enough for 2 dozen cupcakes), but they are available for much cheaper with a little bit of searching.

This blog also has instructions to make wrappers out of scrapbook paper and to edge it with craft scissor.

Merry Christmas

I hope you had a better one than I did.

Look who is

Standing!

She also:

has two teeth
is clapping
crawling like a little speed demon
asserting her personality on everyone in this house.

Guilty pleasure

I have finally found a vampire series I can obsess about. I loved Buffy when it was on and before it went downhill, and despite my dad's conviction it's the devil's show, I thought it was funny and kick ass. So, my sister in law let me borrow her Southern Vampire series books by Charlaine Harris and I was totally hooked this past week. It's the weird combination of being NOTHING like Twilight, and yet I'm convinced that Twilight was a rip off of these books since they started long before that damn book was written. However, a lot of people tell me that Stephenie Meyer stole a lot from the Vampire Diaries which started in the early 90s. So here is my analysis and comparison with Twilight:

The short synopsis is that with the onset of synthetic blood, the vampires have "come out of the coffin" and into the life of Sookie Stackhouse, a telepathic barmaid in Louisiana. Along with vampires, there are shapeshifters, were-animals, fairies, and who knows what else. Havoc ensues.

I like the main character, because instead of being a weak angsty little whiner (cough *Bella* cough cough), she's smart, hardworking, and more importantly, she takes care of herself. First book, she takes out of the bad guy by herself. She also isn't emotionally blackmailed by the cheating or controlling guys around her. Even with weird quirks, I find her more believable because she reacts just like a normal person would.

Unlike the omnipotent Eddie-kins (or as my friend calls him, Ted), the vampires in this series are some of the more flawed characters. Many of them have lost touch with what it means to be a human as many centuries have passed since they have been "turned", and laws and sense of morality has changed in the meantime or they didn't interact much while in hiding. The vampires are sometimes power hungry, not necessarily smart, and very entertaining.

I love Harris's writing style. It's clean, simple, and if there is an occasional big word, she blames it on Sookie's word-of-the-day calendar. Like Twilight, it's written first person, but unlike Twilight, it's consistent. Sookie is always thinking, always feeling, and always cracking wise. She could use some improvement on making sure different characters have different "voices" but dialog is entertaining. I worry a little because she seems to be indiscriminate about introducing, killing off, or villanizing characters. By the eighth book I was having a little trouble keeping everyone straight. She's also killed off a few pregnant women which I have issues with. Faith also loaned them to me with the warning that they're a little trashy. She was wrong. They're COMPLETELY trashy and all the better for it.

I have not watched TrueBlood because we don't have HBO, but I'm now very curious because I like Anna Paquin and now the books. I sometimes have a hard time with translations from page to screen, but I liked the Twilight movie more than book (mostly because I've never laughed so hard in my life). Maybe I'll buy it and review it. Now that I've finished all of them, I have to wait until May until the next book comes out. In the mean time, Go Team Eric!

My new life mantra

As heard on the Big Bang Theory tonight:

Sheldon: "Why are you crying?"

Penny: "Because I'm stupid!"

Sheldon: "That's not a good reason to cry. You should cry because you're sad. I cry because other people are stupid and that makes me sad."

Kind of pathetic

My sister-in-law let me borrow her doorway jumper for Alana because Alana probably only has about two more months before she walks, meaning getting my own would be a waste of money. She's used the jumpers before at the gym, so I knew she liked them but I was surprised how long she'll stay in there, provided I don't leave the room (damn separation anxiety). So Justin put her in there last night and we just let her bounce for a while. Then we looked over to see this:

Yup, she'd fallen asleep. The weird thing was that she was still bouncing! In her sleep! She'd twitch and her legs would pump, bobbing her up and down half heartedly. We put her to bed after getting a quick picture. Still kind of pathetic though.

Do I seem obsessed with hair?

Today a hair fell out randomly from the root, so I decided to measure it. It was 30 inches long and had NO split ends (HA-take that hair restoration people!) I read the average hair growth is 6 inches a year and the average lifespan of hair is 3 years. So either I have freakishly fast hair growth or freakishly long hair lifespan. Either way, I'm a freak. I'm okay with that.

More cutesy baby crap

I saw these online a while ago and thought there were a cute idea for people, but was appalled at the price tag. $35 for four onesies? That have just been cuteified?

So I got a package of onesies, some cupcake liners, and a bakery box that I bribed the grocery store baker into giving me.

I ironed the onesies, but that's my controlling tendencies.

Then I laid the onesie in front of me and gave it a twist. I don't think this was necessary, but I did it so it would bunch instead of just lay flat.

Then I pulled everything to the back...

and bunched it up and taped it.

Then stuck in a cupcake liner. I first thought that I would need the jumbo liners, but it looked funny. Regular ones work just fine.

I just placed them in this bakery box. I think that if I do this in the future, I'm going to 1) get a better looking box and 2) the store bought cupcakes are a little less lumpy looking, which makes me think that they wrap the onesie around a ball or something. I might try that, but the problem is that it only needs to look cute for a minute until all the packaging gets thrown away.

Super fast, easy, and cheap. Show me pics if you do this in the future!

Cute baby crap how-tos

I went a baby shower last night. It was nice, low key and no stupid games, the best kind. I had already given the mother a gift, so I decided to make a diaper cake to take to the shower. I've become a expert at making these as I know 13 (!!!) people that are pregnant, let alone all the people that have had babies recently. It was a huge hit and my sister in law (it was her sister's shower) told me I need to post a tutorial. So here it is:

You will need:

75 diapers-this is 1 1/2 packages of size 1 diapers usually. I like to use Luvs because they are the cheapest brand name diapers and I've heard the least complaints about them.
lots and lots and lots of rubber bands
bottle of sparkling juice
decorations-ribbon, silk flowers, other baby items

Lay the diaper with the coloured side up. Start rolling diaper toward the fold. Roll firmly, but be sure not to roll too tight.

Place a rubber band around rolled up diaper. Repeat about three billion times until all the diapers are rolled up.

Place a rubber band around the lower third of the bottle.

Stick a rolled up diaper in the rubber band. Repeat until the bottle is surrounded by diapers.

Place a new rubber band around the diapers and repeat for a new concentric circle.

Keep adding diapers. For a three layer "cake", there will be three concentric circles on the bottom, two in the middle, and one on the top. Cover rubber bands with ribbon. Stick silk flowers into the top so the bottle doesn't show.

Variations:

This three layer cake only has two concentric circles on the bottom layer and one each on the middle and top. Then the outside is unrolled overlapping diapers placed at even intervals. This takes a few more diapers than the original one (about five more I think), but it makes a neat textured look.

This is a square cake of 56 diapers. I used box of nursing pads in the middle, but you could use anything square or rectangular. I thought about using a box of wipes, but with two kids in diapers, those can be traded as currency in this house.

Other ideas I had:

Making the top layer out of rolled up onesies, receiving blankets, washcloths or burp cloths

Using something else in the middle like cans of formula, feeding bottles, or if you're not LDS, real booze (something for the mom, right?)

For cloth diapering mamas, rolled up liners in the middle and cloth diapers on the outside (this could get really expensive though)

Decorating with rosettes make out of baby booties

This is a fast, relatively cheap present. The cost depends on what type of diapers you get and how many extras you want to add on. Have fun!

I take offense at this

I was watching one of those scrolling ads while waiting for a page to load. It was for a hair repair process at a salon. The person with the "bad" hair was a brunette. Then it fades to a blonde with perfectly sleek and coiffed hair. The next three pictures off "good" hair they showed were also blonde. Coincidence? I THINK NOT! Apparently, hair repair also includes bleaching. I'll just go shave my head now.

Thrifty Mommy post continued

So we don't get a newspaper, which I don't mind generally, but I do miss getting the Sunday coupons because there'd be Pamper coupons usually. But what I'd save on Pampers wouldn't pay for the paper subscription, so I'll continue to look for my pampers coupons in the mail.

BUT, I did discover shortcuts.com, which I love because they just opened a Smith's Marketplace not far from here. You enter your store card number and then you can just hit "add" on the various coupons they have on the website. Then when you check out, all your coupons are on your card and you don't have to have the stupid little pieces of paper with you. It works for any Kroger stores like Fred Meyer, Safeway, QFC, etc.

What thrifty ideas do you have?

Please excuse me

while I descend into one of those "I'm the greatest thrifty Mommy in the world" posts.

Alana won't have to sleep in a cardboard box anymore! Just kidding. She's eight months old and I was thinking that it's really time to get her a crib, but they discontinued the one that I bought for Liam and I was sad. There was one at Target for a while that was close in style and price, but I waited too long and they stopped carrying it in stores. And then I found out that it would cost $70 (!!!) to get it shipped. So I got on Babies R Us tonight and found that their cribs were 20% this weekend, with free shipping, AND they had just started to carry the crib that I liked at Target. When checking out, I realized I hadn't checked to see if any coupons would work, so I moseyed over to retailmenot.com where I found a coupon for an extra $10 off. So the crib that I had been regretting not buying at Target that would have been $267 with tax AND I would have had bribe someone with a truck to get it home? I got for $231 and shipped right to my doorstep.

Then, I figured I might as well get a mattress. So I checked and mattresses also were 20% off AND free shipping AND I got to use my coupon again AND I got a free umbrella stroller. Not bad, eh?

Happy Thanksgiving!

For the record, we are not vegetarians. This comic still cracks me up though.

While I was in Deseret Book...

I had an intense desire to move all of Glenn Beck's books to "Fiction."

Alana waking up and asleep

One time I checked on Alana, I found her with her legs tucked under her and her rear up in the air. By the time I grabbed the camera she was waking up, but it still wasn't graceful:

This was after one of our "baby boot camp" sessions.

She had been screaming, rolled over and tuckered herself out.

Liam and Elmo

My sister sent this towel for Liam for his birthday. He loved it and wouldn't let me take it off. Note the stuffed Elmo also on the couch (hard to tell because he is also red):

Halloween

Sorry for the shadow. I'm still trying to figure out lighting.

She's a gingerbread cookie if you can't tell.

This face just says it all, doesn't it? "For the second day in a row, I'm stuffed back into this thing?!?"

Liam was the chef/baker.

The chef in his kitchen, a birthday present.

Annie Get Your Gun

I've been meaning to post some of the pictures for Annie for a while (and have been hearing about the lack thereof from my sister) but I was waiting until the pictures from the professional photographer had come back. Well, turns out that I would have had to pay for those, so here are the amateur ones from me:

The English dancers surrounding Queen Victoria. The woman who plays QV was a huge crack up.

Russian Folkdancers. Don't those boys looks so pleased to be there?

Italian dancers. The girl second from the right was the sweetest girl ever. She dances with Utah Regional Ballet which was the company attached to the school I used to dance at.

Square dancers. Their ages ranged from 8-11 and there were 16 of them, so it was impossible to get a picture of them all together.

These were some of the costumes that I did. I also had to sew entire ball gowns, but I don't have any pictures of those.

Nutter Butter Ghosts

These are the only thing about Halloween that I look forward to. I used to make them with my mom.

1 Pkg Nutter Butter cookies
2 12 oz pkgs white or vanilla chocolate (one package of cookies uses about 1 1/2 bags, so if you're doubling the recipe, you really only need three)
Couple tbsps shortening
1 pkg mini chocolate chips (Hardly any of these are used, so if you're multiplying the recipe, 1 pkg will be plenty)

Line a cookie sheet with parchment or wax paper. Melt the white chocolate chips with shortening until smooth. With a fork, dip the nutter butter cookies into white chocolate, completely covering the cookie. Tap to get air bubbles out. Set on prepared cookie sheet and arrange the mini chocolate chips into a "face". Refrigerate until coating is hard, about 15 minutes.

Kielbasa Chowder

4-6 potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 onion chopped
2 stalks celery, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1 14 oz can beef broth
1 14 oz can chicken broth
1 cup milk
1 pound kielbasa sausage, sliced into the 1/2 inch pieces
1 can condensed cream of chicken soup
1 can corn, drained
pepper

In a large pot over medium heat, combine potatoes, onion, celery, beef broth, chicken broth, and milk. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer until potatoes are tender, about 15 minutes. Meanwhile, brown kielbasa sausage in a skillet. Stir in sausage, condensed soup, and corn and continue to simmer until heated through and slightly thickened. Season with pepper to taste. Serve hot.

Justin and I think this would be really good in a soup bowl with a little grated cheddar cheese over the top.

Clothing Explosion

Before I got kid locks on the dressers, Liam used to pull all the clothes out of his and Alana's drawers. While I was trying to clean up one time, Liam decided to play with Alana:

Peek-a-boo!

Wait-what just happened?

Cardboard swordfight

I had some cardboard tubes left from wrapping Christmas presents for my nieces. Liam predictably grabbed one. Justin decided that fair is fair and got one for Alana. (Ignore the wreck on the floor, with kids there is inevitably clutter)

Alana was more interested in eating the tube.

The many (funny) faces of Alana