See more Days in Pictures here.
Hometown Summer
Pink Paislee has done it again. Their Hometown Summer collection is one that I will need to stock up on and use over and over! Today I have a couple of pages up at Right at Home Scrapbooking that showcase this awesome line.
Little Big Girl:
The Newest Member of Sox Nation:
Can I say how much I love that this collection works amazingly well for both girl AND boy pages!? See all of the details over at the Right at Home blog.
Carrot Cake Should NOT Have Nuts!
I DO understand that my title is a statement of controversy. However, in my humble opinion carrot cake is NO place for nuts, coconut, pineapple, or any other WEIRD stuff. Carrots. And Cream Cheese Frosting. Period.
So if you add any of those things to my favorite basic carrot cake recipe just don’t tell me, ok? (and I won’t tell you about how I used to eat bologna and BBQ sauce sandwiches in elementary school)
Carrot Cake Cupcakes
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3 cups shredded carrots (the finer the better!)
1 cup cooking oil
4 eggs
1/2 Tablespoon vanilla
- Combine dry ingredients in a mixer bowl.
- Add carrots, oil, eggs, and vanilla and mix until combined.
- Pour into paper lined cupcake pans.
- Bake at 350 degrees until a cake pick inserted into the center comes out clean. I don’t have the exact minutes written down but a safe bet is to check them after 10-12 minutes and go from there!
This makes 24-30 cupcakes but the recipe can easily be halved.
Cream Cheese Frosting
- Beat together: 6 ozs. of softened cream cheese, 1/2 cup softened butter, and 2 teaspoons of vanilla until light and fluffy.
- Gradually add about 4 1/2 cups powdered sugar. Add slightly more sugar for a stiffer frosting or a few drops of milk/cream to make it softer.
All Wrapped Up
I won’t even try to pretend that I don’t have a little problem with the internet. I mean, it’s pretty much the most awesome invention in history, right?? So when this whole tablet phenomenon hit I knew right away that I would want need one.
So we researched. And we waited. And I now have one of these bad boys:
That’s a purty Motorola Xoom. We’re an Android household! 
But of course that means I need to protect Miss Xoom and her lovely glass screen! So I looked into the available cases and discovered they’re very functional and basic and all that great stuff but CLEARLY a man had designed them! Come on… where’s the color!? Where’s the fun!?
So I made my own.
The fabric is by Robert Kaufman and I used both the grey with white circles and the reverse white with grey circles. I love this fabric!
The flowers are various scrap embellishments from BoBunny, Prima, and Maya Road.
I didn’t have a pattern so I pretty much just winged it. It certainly isn’t anything professional and has some wonky bits but it does the job and it makes me happy whenever I look at it so I am calling that a success!
Thank You!
Today I just wanted to thank all of you who read and comment. I can’t tell you how many times I have read your comments and smiled and for that I cannot thank you enough! Sometimes those of us out in blogland can feel like we are talking to ourselves but comments are our lifeline. So, thank you, whether it be a comment on one of my layouts, general pats on the back, or words of encouragement I wanted to let you know that your words matter!
Disappointing People
Almost everything I have posted on this blog so far has been positive and happy. I am generally a positive and happy person. But sometimes a little thought worms its way into my head and stays there until I just get it out so that is what this post is going to be! Maybe I’ll scare some of you off by not being all sunshine and sweetness today but I hope that more of you will identify with what I am writing.
I have decided I have reached the point in my life where I just don’t need any more disappointing people around me. I’m cutting them out. They are of no use except to make me feel crappy.
There’s one particular person… maybe you have one in your life too… who has a tendency to think it’s ok to pop in and out of my life. This person uses the word “friend” but all my other friends don’t pull those sort of punches.
Here’s what I consider a friend (in relation to this particular offender):
- A real friend stays in my life. You experience the fun AND the hardships that go along with daily living and you don’t just take off and disappear for years at a time and then expect me to welcome you back to my life like no time has passed.
- A real friend is OPEN about their life. Don’t call yourself a friend and then make it completely one-sided. So what you want from me is all the info about MY life, but you are completely unwilling to share yours? Um, no.
- A real friend owns up to their faults and the wrongs they’ve done. Don’t gloss over major issues. Don’t feed me a lame “sorry about that” and think that’s going to cover it.
- A real friend is honest. Please don’t lie to me about how you just happened to stumble upon me and decided to contact me. I’m not stupid. The only thing lies do is draw lines in the sand… lines that divide “friend” and “not a friend”.
So here’s a shout out…. because I know you will read this and not admit it: It’s my turn. I’m done. I miss you. I will always love you. But I can’t play your games anymore. If there ever comes a time when you feel like you can be my friend (see rules above) then you know how to find me. But don’t bother until then. I’m just not interested in that kind of friendship. You’ve simply disappointed me one too many times.
And that’s my deal today.
Ahhhhh, that feels better!!!
Now back to our regularly scheduled puppies and rainbows.
Blame it on the Boogie
Not THAT kind of a boogie! Although, with a sixteen month old that could have been entirely possible.
I’ve sort of been into old school embroidery lately. But of course this is me we’re talking about and because I am pretty much the very definition of “cool” I like to put a new school spin on yer grandma’s crafts.
Behold Owen’s new under $2 t-shirt, Robo Boogie:
I got the embroidery pattern from the awesome site Urban Threads and the t-shirt was in the clearance pile at Old Navy for a whopping $1.73. How’s THAT for thrifty and one of a kind?
Of course Owen was in no mood to stand still (I will personally send all of you a memo if he is ever in that mood) but here are a few shots of him modeling it. It’s hard to freeze frame a whirling toddler!
And this one only because I CAN NOT RESIST those chins and teeth!
Blogging about Blogging
Today is the first day of Shimelle’s Beyond Blogging for Scrapbookers online class. I really got a lot from the original Blogging for Scrapbookers class so this seemed like a natural progression.
We’ve been asked to do something I’ve been thinking a lot about anyway: figure out the focus of our blogs! I tend to blog mostly about scrapbooking (obviously) but I find it hard to update ONLY about scrapbooking, which is why you get posts about baking, other crafts, and my personal life from time to time.
So I’ve decided to do a fun little poll to see what you (my glorious, wonderful readers!!) prefer to see written here. Feel free to elaborate on your choices, or anything I did not include but you would also like to see. You can choose more than one!
A quick Springtime craft!
Ok, yeah, I’ll admit it. I have a bit of a “problem” with flowers. You know the ones… the little jars of Prima flowers that are so packed you have no idea how you could use them all. Somewhere along the way I realized I was a tad foolish for buying these jars and I’ve been trying to come up with ways to use the little buggers.
This craft was pretty mindless and fun and uses up a whole bunch of those flowers you know you have in your stash!
You’ll need:
- styrofoam eggs from the craft store
- pearl head pins
- flowers in various colors and small sizes
- scraps of ribbon
It’s a no-brainer, really. Place a small flower on top of a slightly larger one and use a pin to stick it in the egg. Repeat. A lot.
When the egg is completely covered you simply tie a length of ribbon into a bow and use another pin to attach it to the egg. Voila! Hang and enjoy your new Spring pretties!
May Arts Spring Banner
Check out the May Arts blog for a tutorial on how to make this sweet Spring banner! I used raw canvas, Pink Paislee’s Sweetness collection and a ton of gorgeous ribbons and trims from May Arts. They are looking for some additions to their Design Team so if you are the voting type I would love a comment on their blog. 
It’s perfect for brightening up your home this time of year!
I’m not trying to skip Spring
BUT… the colors of Summer have really been calling to me! Pink Paislee’s Hometown Summer brought me back to sprinklers, cherry popsicles, and the lazy days of Summer when I worked with it for Right at Home Scrapbooking this month.
I’ll have more of Hometown Summer later in the month but for now you can see what I had to say about this adorable line on the Right at Home blog!
Messy Messy Messy!
The newest prompt at Scrap That Baby is up and this time it’s all about the MESSES that our little ones make!
I used this PencilLines sketch as inspiration for my layout about the disaster that Owen creates every time he eats:
Enter your messy layouts at Scrap That Baby before April 14th and you could win a great prize pack from Nikki Silvis!