Purple Ombre Cake

So, what else is there to do on a boring summer monday night then make a cake? ;) I added pudding mix to my cake which made it even better.

Picture Frame turned Dry Erase Boards

I recently saw on Pinterest a tutorial about taking a picture frame and turning it into a dry erase board by placing scrapbook paper or notebook paper behind the glass. How easy, right? I had to do it. You can find the tutorial here, but it really is quite simple. I found some cool paper at the scrapbook store, and I think it turned out amazing. Perfect for our grocery lists! It costs under $2 too! Gotta love Goodwill. :)

Turn a Potholder into a Curling Iron Case!

Do you ever find that when your on trips, you curl or straighten your hair, then realize you have no where to put your hot curling iron when packing? I always end up wrapping clothes around it, which I hate doing. I know you can buy cases for them, but they're easily $20. So, I went to the dollar store and bought a potholder. I folded it in half, and sewed along the bottom and the side. Ta-da! Now, I have a case for it that I don't worry about it getting hot. Easiest project ever.

Happy First Day of Summer!

With all this heat lately, I was suprised that summer had not even officially started til today! So, what to do on a 92 degree day? Drink Umbrella Wreath. Yup, saw it on Pinterest. Easiest wreath to do. Went to Michaels, bought a $4 (with coupon) styrofoam wreath, and drink umbrellas from a party store and just stuck them on. Nice project to do in AC. :)

Mini Chicken Pot Pies!

Leftovers. We all have them. I had some leftover chicken to cook up, and just went on a couponing haul and got 6 boxes of Bisquick. Typed both ingredients into google, and ta-da! Mini Chicken Pot Pies.
You can find the recipe here. The directions aren't very clear, so here's what I did.

First, mix the base (1/2 cup of milk, 1/2 Bisquick, and 2 eggs). Grease 12 muffin tins, Pour a tablespoon of the base in each muffin cup. Next, add your filling (I cooked up on the stove top 1lb. chicken, cut up carrots and celery, and a little chicken broth) and fill it to the top of your muffin tin. Lastly, pour another tablespoon of your base on top. Cook at 350 for 28-30 min. They are super delish and perfect for leftover chicken!

$3 Candle Votive

Do you ever find your self endlessly wandering in a dollar store at 9:30 at night? Frankly, I do it all the time. I found this awesome vase for $1, but I really didn't need any more vases. Then, I came accross clear pebbles for $1 a bag, so I somehow came up with the idea of getting two seperate bags of stones (different colors and sizes) and glue-ing them onto my awesome vase. I spent $3 and ended up with an AWESOME candle votive. :)

Turn Fabric Into Instant Wallpaper!

A few months ago, we attempted to take down this nasty wallpaper we had in our kitchen. Underneath it was just absolutely atrocious. We would have to sand it, paint it, and do all sorts of stuff to try to fix it. It was just plain NASTY. The day before, we had picked up a huge haul of fabric, and then thought, why don't we just put fabric up? We attempted a few different ways to put it up, finally liquid starch did the trick. It wasn't to hard either! The best part is, when we get sick of the fabric, we can take it down and put more up. It's SUPER easy to pull off to. We don't have to worry about sanding or painting it, or hours taking wallpaper down. I think it turned out pretty fabulous. :-)

Graduation Party Time!

My brother just graduated from High School, and since I'm a Pinterest addict, I've seen so many ideas, so with some tough convincing, he let me plan his party.

I was trying to figure out what in the world to get him for his graduation present. I didn't want to do what everyone else does, and just give him money. He loves chocolate, so I thought of maybe doing a card that Incorporated chocolate. I had seen something similar to this on Pinterest, but I wanted to make it a little more personal for him. I ended up with an extremely huge card, and he LOVED it!

It says "Congratulations on getting your WHATCHAMACALLIT! We think our eyes are playing TWIX. We will not SNICKER, and you will only hear a SYMPHONY of cheers as you graduate.You have proven you are not an AIRHEAD, LEMONHEAD, or DUM DUM. You are a SMARTIE. We hope you SKOR a PAYDAY somewhere between ZERO and 100GRAND. But don't let it slip through your BUTTERFINGERs. Avoid thinking that you are a RED HOT Big Hunk or a POP ROCK Star. TAKE 5 and enjoy your carefree summer. Get ready to hit the books EXTRA hard and CRUNCH the numbers. You may hit a SOUR PATCH. You can always count on us if you need a LIFESAVER."
I saw on Pinterest this awesome idea of having all the vegetables in cups ahead of time with dip in the bottom. My brother chose to have his party on a nice hot summer 91 degree day. I didn't want to get the guests sick with warm dip, so I put the dip container in ice. But I loved that it was a quick easy way to get vegetables. Because the tongs  you use to get them normally are a BIG pain.
Is it just me, or is there nothing grosser (if that's even a word), than 150 people all sticking their hand in the same potato chip bowl?! I went to my local dollar store, bought 100 lunch sacks for $1, and cut them to the size of bag I wanted. WAY better than germy potato chips. :)

This next food is absolutely one of the best deserts of all times. Mini Fruit Pizza. I made about 250, and they were almost all gone by the end of the party. First step, make sugar cookies. Below is a family recipe that is by far the #1 Sugar Cookie Recipe.

Sour Cream Sugar Cookies
1 c. butter
1 c. white Sugar
1 egg slightly beaten
3 c. of sifted flour (I highly recommend sifting it!)
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 c. of sour cream
Cream butter, add sugar, then beat well. Add egg and sour cream. Sift flour, nutmeg, soda, and salt then add to mixture and mix well. Chill for an hour. Roll dough to 1/4 in. Cut with circular cookie cutter. Bake 8-10 min. @ 350.

Next step, make whipped topping. Take a 16 oz. container of cool whip, and an 8 oz. container of cream cheese. Beat with mixer until all the cream cheese chunks are gone.

Last, I piped the whipped topping with a cupcake tip onto the sugar cookies, then added different kinds of fruits (blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, etc.) And wa-la! Yummiest dessert ever!

Now, to come up with a main course. Oh, the expensive options, right? Wrong! Have you ever seen those 6 foot long party subs? If not, they're the definition of epic. I went to my local Subway, and they wanted to charge me $66 for a 6ft, and I would have to pay extra for condiments (like onions, tomatoes, etc.) and cheese! Someone had suggested to me that Walmart makes the subs as well. It costs $28 for a 6ft. there, AND included condiments and cheese. They said the sub typically feeds 30 people, I got it to feed around 50. PS-they don't fit in refrigerators very well.

You know those toothpick things you stick in sandwiches, I thought I had a few in my house. I thought wrong. So what did I have, a bag full of new golf tees! And my brother is a crazy golf fan, so I thought how perfect!

Guest books for grad parties are typically always the same. They get a picture mat that people can sign around the picture of the graduate. Well, I had an even better idea. I went to walmart and picked up 2 $.99 cans of white spray paint, then went to my local dollar store and bought two identical 48 piece puzzles (made sure pieces were large). I then spray painted the puzzle pieces (it took two coats). Put some pens and a sign out, and at the end of the party, he could put the puzzle together and see all the people who helped him graduate.

Detroit Tigers Themed Party

I'm a huge baseball fan, so I thought I might as well have a baseball party! When I think of a baseball game, the first thing that comes to mind is popcorn. So I made popcorn with my popcorn popper. I also LOVE caramel corn, and found an awesome recipe for it here.

Lately, cake balls have become extremely popular so I thought why not. Incase you don't know how to make cake balls, all you do is bake a cake, let it cool, crumble the cake, add icing, and roll it into balls. Not to difficult. I went to Hobby Lobby and saw blue and white colored chocolate. I picked up two bags of white chocolate and one bag of blue. It was about $2 a bag because I had my 40% off coupon. I dipped the cake balls in the white chocolate, and drizzled blue over it. It covered around 60 cake balls.

What's a party without cupcakes? I found these awesome cupcake toppers at my local party store. It was $2 for a pack of twenty-four. This recipe is by far the best vanilla buttercream frosting i've ever tried.

I also found at Hobby Lobby these awesome paper laterns. It was to windy to put them outside, but they looked awesome. They were $1 each with my 40% off coupon.




Now, what games to play. I had a group of girls who aren't big fans of actually playing sports, so I went browsing on google and found this Baseball Nickname Matching Quiz.

I also went to this site, and created my own bingo card. Everyone was given a bingo card and a pen, and when I said go, had to run around to different people and ask them if a specific square applied to them. You can see different ideas I had. Then, the first person to get a bingo won.

Whenever I go to a baseball game, there is always a raffle giveaway. On a trip to my local dollar store, they had a roll of raffle tickets for $2, so I thought why not! Everyone would be given raffle tickets for being early, wearing baseball gear, RSVPing, winning games, etc. And at the end of the night, I gave away several prizes.


I also love going to Salvation Army, because I find the coolest things. I found this cake stand there for $1! It was a nasty yellow, so I spray painted it blue, and wa-la! I also found these amazing colorful plates at Dollar Tree for $1 each. It ended up costing $4 for this!

DIY Wallet

I love Vera Bradley, but I don't like the price. I recently got a new VB bag, and I wanted to get a matching wallet. But, I really didn't feel like paying $30. I decided to make my own. I found an awesome tutorial here. This is the BEST wallet, because you have a spot for your phone, credit cards, notepad, etc. Best part, it wasn't to hard to make either! I bought a yard of fabric for the outside and inside lining, I ended up making 4 wallets with the fabric I bought. So it cost me around $2 a wallet.

Easy Inexpensive Pillow Re-do

    In the past few months, I've been seeing alot of the 'baroque' pattern, and like many, have fallen in love with it! I recently found a lampshade at Lowes with the pattern, and had to have!
    So, now my dillema, I have no pillows to go with it! I looked around for pillows, and to my suprise, they were easily $30 a pillow, and I was not going to spend that. I went to Joann's (had my 50% off coupon of course) and spent $3.50 for fabric. I spent a little extra because I wanted the outdoor furniture material. Then I went to my local Salvation Army, and bought an ugly mustard yellow pillow for $1. Sewing a pillow is one of the easiest sewing projects, because you really just have to sew a straight line. You can find the tutorial here. And wa-la! You have a pillow under $5.
   Best part is you can change it out for every season, or if you're like me, needs something different every couple of weeks. :)