We Love Pinterest!

I hosted a Pinterest party for our monthly dinner this month, and it was so much fun!  We had a menu created from Pinterest recipes, a Valentine craft inspired by Pinterest, and a gift exchange of Pinterest inspired items!  February was the perfect month for this theme because the red and white of the Pinterest logo fits with Valentine colors, and I could not be happier with how it turned out!

 

Invite:  I first told guests about this event 2 months ago, and I let them know that they would be asked to bring a Pinterest item they create for a gift exchange.  This could be a recipe they made, a scarf they knitted, a craft item they made, whatever they chose to create.  Giving them advance notice helped because my friends are some busy ladies and this gave them time to plan.  I also sent a PicCollage reminder 3 weeks before as another reminder, and then of course this invitation.  I made this invitation on PhotoShop and combined Pinterest with Valentine's Day images and colors.

Inside Decor:  Red, white, and black were my party colors - the Pinterest colors. I set my table with simple items I already owned, but added a bit of a Valentine/Pinterest touch.  

I found a red and white striped dry-erase board at a garage sale to place under my centerpiece (the red hearts are just scrapbook paper confetti).  I already owned the Valentine table runner. I bought some Valentine's ribbon and wrapped it around my cake platter, candle, and vase.  Created a mini heart banner for a white pitcher I borrowed from a friend, added a red heart to a chalkboard sign I made, and filled a heart dish I purchased for $2.50 at Target for red and white gumballs I stole out of our family's gumball machine!

I dressed up my dinner plates by topping them with these red heart-shaped paper plates I found at Michaels.  I cut the white Pinterest logo out with my Cricut machine to place in the center.  We used these plates for our first course of the dinner.

I also added the pinterest logo to the napkin.

I had fun creating these placecards.  At first, I looked up DIY place cards on Pinterest and thought I might create something inspired by Pinterest.  However, I decided instead to make my place card directly Pinterest themed.  I created a fake Pinterest board and called it Amazing Friends.  I just used random numbers for "pins".  I went through my photos from past monthly dinners, and I made the main photo a single photo of my guest, and the two side photos group photos with the featured guest in them.

To cover up the place card stand and add a little fun, my daughter and I quickly crafted these yarn puff balls in the party colors.

I already had mantle decor for Valentine's Day, so I put these up.  To add a bit more, I created this easy heart banner out of cardstock.  After cutting strips of red, white, and black, I stapled them together in a heart shape.  Super quick and easy.

I created simple wine labels that combined the Valentine and Pinterest theme.  I usually like to come up with something clever for my wine labels, but not this time.  Just stayed simple.

For wine charms, I found these metal circles etched with various words in the scrapbook section at Michael's.  I used my Cricut to create a slightly large red circle behind them and tied them to the stem of each glass.  I chose the etchings that were related to our theme (xoxo, love, create, heart, etc.) although some were other kinds of words (faith, happy, etc.)

I love using Pinterest for crafts, so I wanted to have a simple, quick craft that guests could create as they arrived and chatted.  This craft was perfect!  I set out all my wine corks for guests to use to create a wine cork heart as a Valentine display.  

All the supplies were set on the table - corks, glue guns, heart template, red paint, and a paint brush.  Guests used the heart template to line up the corks in a heart shape before hot gluing them together.  Then they painted the top of the corks red, and they were done!  You can make your heart template any size.  Just make sure you have enough corks for all your guests to be able to do it.  My template used 24 corks for each heart.

Menu:  It was easy to find a menu for this dinner because there are a TON of recipes I have pinned over the years and always wanted to try.  I paired some of these recipes with Valentine's related menu items.  We started with a simple spinach salad with strawberries cut into hearts.  It also had blueberries, toasted almonds, and feta cheese.  I served it with a strawberry vinaigrette dressing.

For the main dish I made a simple smoked Tri-Tip on our Traeger grill.  I always love the Traeger because I don't have to babysit the meat while it grills, and I can put it on a leave.  Plus, we love everything we cook on the Traeger! So yummy!  I made two of these tri-tips and just refilled the tray when this one was finished.

Lately I have been loving brussel sprouts and I haven't served them at a monthly dinner yet, so I made these roasted parmesan sprouts.  They were tasty.

I also made these cute heart-shaped potatoes.  To be honest, I didn't really follow the Pinterest recipe on this one as I make potato bites often for my family (just not in hearts).  These were simple to make, but it does take time to cut the heart shape out with a cookie cutter.  Make sure you place the cut potatoes in water so they don't brown while you get them all cut out.

For dessert, we had a simple chocolate caramel fondue that I found on Pinterest.  I used my centerpiece heart bowl to hold the chocolate and surrounded it with strawberries, bananas, angel food cake, and vanilla wafers. I had to incorporate chocolate into the menu as a chocolate dipped strawberries are a favorite Valentine treat!

Party Activity - My favorite part of the night was the Pinterest gift exchange!  I had the guests wrap their creations, and we drew numbers for choosing gifts.  Like at Christmas time gift exchanges, we decided each creation could be stolen one time before it was "frozen."  These girls came up with some super fun and crafty gifts.  These are just some of them.  Top left is a guide to writing cool fonts with a metal tin and the supplies/items to create as you learn those fonts.  Bottom left is a WIFI sign to put up in your home.  On the right is a cute Valentine decor sign made with buttons!

Here are some more from the gift exchange. Left is what I made - a giant wooden welcome sign I painted. Top right is individual sugar scrubs that are hearts!  Bottom right is chocolate dipped Oreos and pretzels made to look like cute little bees. Yumzzzzz!

Favor:  Speaking of chocolate dipped Oreos, I made these dipped Oreos to look like the Pinterest logo for guests as a parting gift.  I piped the "P" on the front in white chocolate.

Another great night with my closest friends.  If you have girlfriends like mine that love a good night out and a little Pinterest, this is a fun party. Mix up this party however works for you...leave out the gift exchange and ask guests to bring parts of the meal.  Or just do a craft with your meal.  So fun!

Something Blue - A Dinner for the Bride

I am so excited that one of my closest friends is getting ready to marry a wonderful man this month.  To honor this beautiful lady and to celebrate her upcoming marriage, I decided to theme are monthly dinner in her honor.

Invite: I designed a simple invitation on Photo Shop.  While our dinners are often silly and fun themed, I wanted this one to be special, so I went with a very classic and simple design. I asked all the girls to wear some sort of blue shirt/dress, and I asked Kelli to wear white.

Entry Decor: I used Sharpie and foam board to create a sign for the entry door counting down the days until Kelli's wedding.  Hanging on the door, I pulled out my own wedding veil to drape.  My veil was super long, so I had to fold it a ton at the top so it wouldn't drag on the ground.  To hide the bulge, I bought some flowers to fashion into a bouquet to cover it.

Interior Decor: I wanted all the decorations to be very elegant, but also have a little rustic flare as that is Kelli's personality.  I set the table with a blue tablecloth for Something Blue, a little white rustic looking box I bought at Michaels, and a vase with white roses in the center. I also bought these cute iron-like letters from Michaels to spell out the couples initials.

I also decorated the table with upside down wine glasses with roses inside and candles on top. The roses inside I just bought at the Dollar Tree and pulled off the stems.  I used my wedding china (don't you just love it!) for our plates.

For napkin rings, I tied a blue ribbon around a white napkin and added a diamond ring sticker to the center.

I made simple place cards out of card stock and the same diamond ring stickers I used for the napkins. To make them stand up, I cut off a little bit of the bottom of a cork and then sliced a slit in the top. My friend and her fiance love wine, and they are getting married in Temecula, so I wanted to incorporate wine a little bit in the decor -- this is how I did it.

I designed two wine bottle labels that went with the theme.  Here Comes the Bride All Dressed in WHITE for the the white wine, and for the red blend, I found a romantic silhouette on Google and added The Perfect Blend with the couples names.

For wine charms I tied a simple blue bow around the stem of each wine glass, and put various wedding themed scrapbook stickers on the base.

Menu: Again, I wanted the food I served to be elegant, but I also wanted to stick with the Something Blue theme.  I served steak with a blue cheese mixture on top (super yummy), vegetables, and mashed potatoes.  I died butter blue and used a heart-shaped cookie cutter to cut out a heart.

I also served a Blue Pear Salad jello that I cut into hearts, and a spinach salad with blue berries and a light dressing I made mixing raspberry lemon concentrate with dijon, vinegar, and sugar.

For dessert, I served cheesecake pudding and blueberries in little shot glasses. I made a crumb mixture with vanilla wafers for the bottom, and then alternated between the pudding and the blueberries before topping it off with whipped cream. I forgot to take a photo of this, but this image is similar to what I made.

I also made these bridal dress sugar cookies for dessert.

Favors: I bought little champagne bottles as both a favor and to do a toast to the bride. I created the label on Photoshop.

I also designed these mini white boxes on Photoshop to give to each guest. The top of the box read: Thanks for celebrating Kelli's future "I Do" Here's a little Something Blue for you!  Inside I put a bottle of light blue nail polish for each guest. Isn't the chalkboard sign a TOE-tally cool addition to this favor?

A Gift for the Bride: To cap off the evening, I put together a little gift basket of wine for my friend and her future husband to drink at special moments during their first year of marriage.  The girls all pitched in, so it was from all of us.  I designed the tags stealing some sayings from the Internet and creating some of my own.

I went to the grocery store with these "firsts" in mind, so I tried to pick out wines that matched.  For the Honeymoon, I chose a bottle of Flip Flop Cabernet Sauvignon.  They are traveling to Hawaii on their honeymoon, so this was a perfect match.  For First Home, I chose a bottle of Chateau (which means home in French) St. Jean.  For First Date Night as Mr. and Mrs., I chose a Little Black Dress Pinot Noir.  For First Fight, I chose a Mad Housewife Cabernet Sauvignon.  For First Dinner Party, I chose a bottle of Cabernet called Spin the Bottle!  Last, but not least, for their First Anniversary, I chose a Layered Cake wine since it is tradition to "save" part of your wedding cake to eat on your first anniversary.

I am so grateful for my friendships with these ladies, and I cannot wait to celebrate my good friend Kelli's wedding. I wish her all the happiness in the world!

Congratulations Kelli!

Sixth Anniversary Gift

As you may remember from my Fifth Anniversary gift post last year, I like to try to give my husband gifts that match up with traditional or sometimes modern wedding anniversary gift traditions.  For a sixth anniversary, the traditional gift is candy or iron and the modern is wood.  Here is what I came up with:

I bought an iron bucket from Michaels and filled it with various candy bars.  I attached cute sayings to each candy bar for a personalized touch.  It isn't a keepsake gift, but it was fun to put together and come up with special/funny phrases for the candy bars.  Here are just some of my favorites...

 

You could totally use this idea for Valentine's Day or as a birthday gift. When my hindsight kicked in, I was also thinking I could have given my husband a candy bar a week or every other week throughout our 6th year as a gift instead of a one-time basket.  This may have been a better idea to keep the silly romance going all year long as well as spread out the tooth decay!!

I made the tags on Microsoft Word.  If you would like the file, comment below with your email address and I'd be happy to send them.

Happy Anniversary Honey!

Oprah's Favorite Things Inspired Gift

As a working mom, I never watched the Oprah Winfrey show, but what human being hasn't heard about Oprah's Favorite Things show and all the amazing gifts she gives away to her studio audience? After hearing from a friend of mine about a Christmas gift she received, I decided to put these two "favorite things" ideas together in order to craft a birthday gift for one of my closest friends.

A little Photo Shop magic, and it's no longer an Oprah Magazine cover with Oprah and Ellen, but a personalized magazine cover with my friend's and my face!  I printed this image as the front cover of the birthday card I made to look like a magazine.  Hilarious!

Instead of writing a happy birthday message inside the card, I wanted to stick with the magazine theme. I decided to write a letter to the C&D Magazine subscribers of course mentioning my friend's birthday and how amazing she is. It also gave me a chance to explain the gift.

Just four of the items included.

For the actual gift, I bought 10 items that are some of my friend and my favorite things.  Each of these items was tied with a tag made on my Cricut machine. I tried to keep each item within a budget, so some items were purchased and others were handmade.  For example, my daughter really wanted to make my friend something too, and she decided to color a Little Mermaid picture for her.  I cut out the coloring book page after Ella was done, backed it with card stock, and then added it to the gift. My friend loved it!

Inside the card/magazine, I explained the included items much like Oprah does in her magazine. I did all these pages on Microsoft Word with images from Google.  I cut them to be 10"x7" (my card was 5x7) and folded them in half to place inside the "magazine".  I didn't have a stapler large enough to reach the fold, so I hole punched two small holes on the fold with my mini punch and threaded thin white ribbon through them/tied a knot to secure the book.

I also included some advertisement pages.  I did this mainly to fill up blank spots in the "magazine", but I also thought it would make it seem a bit more authentic. I chose images that I could easily manipulate with text boxes, etc, so that I could personalize them.

I had a lot of fun making this gift, and my friend really got a kick out of it. I wanted to share the idea with my readers in case you are looking for a creative way to present a gift in the future!  Enjoy!

DIY Wine Bottle Candles

I have received several emails asking how I cut the wine bottles for my Wild About Wine party, so I thought I would provide a quick tutorial.

The supplies you will need:

• Glass Cutting Tool (Lowes $4)
• Magazines/books
• Plenty of empty wine bottles
• tea kettle to boil water
• protective eye wear
• Dremel with grinding stone

Step One:  Make sure your wine bottles are empty, clean, and the cork/lid is removed.  Then place the bottle on a table and use books/magazines to elevate the glass cutter to the desired height. I cut all my bottles a quarter inch or so above the label.  I used books at the bottom of the stack and magazines at the top because the magazines are able to form around the glass cutter making it more adjustable.

Step Two:  My husband held the stack of magazines/cutter down firmly so the blade did not move.  Make sure you eye it to make sure it is level as well before you begin. Next, I pressed the bottle firmly into the blade so that it scored the bottle rotating it to get a continuous score around the entire bottle.  It took several tries for me to figure out how to do this, so start with practice bottles (not your cherished bottle from your wedding day!).

Step Three: Boil water in a tea kettle. I placed an old towel in the bottom of the sink to prevent the bottle from dropping into the hard sink and breaking, but this is not essential.  Hold the scored bottle over the towel and slowly pour the hot water from the kettle over the scored line, rotating the bottle as you pour.  Repeat this with cold water from the faucet. We found that a steady light stream of water is best.  The larger stream seemed to cause more breaks.  Continue alternating between the hot and cold water until the bottle naturally breaks and comes apart. Reminder: Make sure the lid/cork is off!!

If you are using the tops of the bottles as your candle holder, you can be done at this point.  You do not need to sand the edges because an uneven edge actually helps your candle flame stay lit. It allows air a pathway inside beyond just the top. However, if you are placing these directly on a table, I recommend lightly sanding them to avoid rough edges scratching your table. 

If you are making a candle holder with the bottom, continue with the fourth step...

Step Four:  Take a sander and carefully sand the top of the rim to give it a smooth edge.  Make sure you wear protective goggles for safety.  If you don't have a Dremel, you can use very fine sand paper it will just take much longer and is a difficult job.

After sanding the top to even the edges, rinse out the bottle and you're ready for your candle!  Optional:  You can polish the sanded edge which would look even better.  The only reason I didn't do this is because I did all these bottles hours before the party started and ran out of time!!

Hope your wine bottle candles turn out great!