Kiwi Crate Adventures!

Kiddo is either hit or miss about her Kiwi Crates. I think it's because she's still a little too young for some of the activities. However, I'll continue to get them for a while to see how she lines them before making a decision. 

This past month's Kiwi Crate involved dinosaurs, something that she loves! I figured this one might be a little more in her areas of interest so we might be able to actually do the activities together. 

She LOVED making her dinosaur feet and visor! Even though we got a little sidetracked before I could string the feet to put on her, she likes carrying them around with her and pretending to be a dinosaur. 

It took a while for her to warm up to making the dinosaur fossils, but once she started, she didn't want to stop! 

We can't wait to see what our next Kiwi Crate brings us!

Craft Power!

There has been lots of crafting going on here lately. I've been doing lots of DIY stuff for the kiddo's second birthday party. It's going to be a zoo/safari themed party. I made the invitations. (Yep, me! I did it all by myself!) I found some awesome printables through Pinterest for the goodie bags, drink holders, and a birthday banner. I've also been trying to decide what DIY decorations of the animal variety that I want to do. I have opted to go with this cute zebra print table cloth since I want to decorate with animals. I found this on the Martha Stewart website, and instantly fell in love it with.  I decided to try and make one today. It came out SO cute!

So, the coloring part was easy. I wonder how the rest of it is going to go. 

ADORABLE!

I forgot about backing it with something, so my little guy is very flimsy, but I'm sure I can make him work. Also, my blowers were too big for the hole. I think I'm going to just cut that part off and use him as a decoration.

Also, the kiddo LOVES Super Why, and I found this puzzle at Kohl's on sale for $5. Since she's too little to actually put it together, I thought it would make a great decoration for her bedroom. (Her bedroom just has bare walls, minus the frog on a mini-canvas I got out of the dollar bin at Target.) Once I find my hammer and some nails, she will now have this:

So, my border isn't perfect, but I think it turned out pretty awesome for my first time with puzzle glue! 

Homemade Christmas Gifts...From Me

I know, I know. I'm not crafty. The title of this post may have thrown you because you know that and are shocked that I would dislike anyone enough to give them a homemade Christmas gift. WRONG! I love my brother and when I found these super hero ornaments on Pinterest, I knew they would make the perfect gift! Besides, they didn't look too hard to make. Wrong...

I started with the very essential process of buying paint and cutting out super hero logos. I learned that sometimes it is worth it to spend the extra 40 cents on "real red" because "red rose" looks orange. Hence the reason there is an Aquaman ornament.

I thought we were going to be painting these, but it was even easier than that! You put the paint in the ornament and then let it fill itself. This was hard for me because I have ZERO patience. This was the worst part for me, but somehow I made it through. 

The mostly final product! I went back to the store for red paint to do the one for The Flash and I picked up some silver paint to do Batman (my brother's FAVORITE super hero!). My brother will have a complete set of ornaments that he'll actually like. 

Pat on the back to me for finding a craft on Pinterest that kind of turned out like it was supposed to!

Adios Free Time!

Today is my last free day for a long time. I will admit, I am taking a day off during all of this craziness to spend with my daughter and my family to help me stay grounded. Work is about to get crazy busy, but I'm still holding strong to my commitment to stick with my resolutions! So, let's get to this week's Adventure in Cooking and get a recap on some of those resolutions, shall we?

Adventures in Cooking
This week my worthy kitchen opponent was the Doritos Chicken Bake.

These ingredients don't look too intimidating. 

Don't let those cute ingredients fool you!

So, it looks good, right? It tasted ok. The only problem was some of the chips on the edges were burnt. I also realized after the fact that I forgot to put the Rotel in. That may have made a difference, it may not have made a difference, either way, the kitchen won this one. 

*Craft Star *

Just have to brag about my craft star moment! I saw on Pinterest (which I'm still convinced is of the devil somehow) that you can write on plain coffee mugs with Sharpies and put it in the oven and then you have personalized coffee mugs. Since I would only be out the $1 for the mug if this didn't turn out, I figured I may as well try it. Here's my creation:

I have a feeling that these may be a popular Christmas gift as this one turned out pretty awesome, if I do say so myself. 

Also, I've got a little holiday spirit going on with my Mardi Gras bow! There's some exciting stuff planned for Mardi Gras, so be watching the blog for that excitement. 

I also got a little creative and made a battery box to store all the batteries for the kiddo's toy collection. 

Date Day
I'm having a date today and I'm cheating a little on the lunch plans. We had LOTS of gumbo left over from the meal for our donors at the game yesterday so I brought some home and have "made" this fabulous meal:

Shhh! Don't tell him that this is how it started!

When you put it in a pot, he'll never know!

That will be placed in bowls before he arrives. 

Tear and bake cookies count as homemade, right? 

A partially made table should score some bonus points. 

I just thought this would be a fun game. 

RESOLUTION RECAP 

(1) Cook one meal a month. This blog is proof that I have done a decent job of keeping up with this one. I also have meals planned out for the entire month of February. 

(2) Read one book a month. I managed to actually read more than one book this month. Books for January: The No Sex Clause, Worth the Weight, The Aspen Account

(3) Donate to charity each month. This month I donated to Heifer International which is an organization that provides resources to poor families in third world countries to help them get on their feet financially. 

(4) Place $500 in savings. This one had a small set back this month as I had to take money out of savings. Things seem to have calmed down financially, so I should be able to get back on track next month. 

(5) Visit William. TBA

(6) Exercise/Drop Weight. I dropped 3.5 pounds this month, so I'm one month into making this one stick. 

Craft Fail

Today, I decided to get crafty. My office mate fully supported me in this endeavor and today was both a success and a fail. I saw this really cool idea on Pinterest (where all good ideas start) of spray painting wine bottles one color and then wrapping them in rubber bands and spray painting a different color so it has this really cool graphic effect. I also found another cool idea of painting cheap glass bowls with acrylic paint and then spray them with a sealer of some sort so it doesn't chip. I had the brilliant idea to use up the acrylic paint I had left over from a project that I did for the kiddo’s birthday party in September. I bought some dollar store square candle holder type things and thought I would do the whole wrap it in rubber bands and use a different color just like the spray paint. Well, here is how that turned out. 

The colors I have just happen to be the colors for my college

and the colors of the college I worked for before moving here. 

It started off so well. We painted them one solid color. Not that difficult, right? 

Rubber bands and the second color. We're already feeling this was a bad idea. 

You might not be able to tell, but the rubber bands on the red and white one decided

to break during the painting of the red coat. 

Final product. Not what I thought it would look like.

 Unlike my office mate, I saw this craft fail all the way to be bitter end. 

This side didn't turn out too bad. At least it seemed more like my vision. 

After the craft fail, I decided to turn the red and white one into this.