My Scentsy Buddy Giveaway



Arent these just SO cute!

A long time ago I realized that unless your house looks like an episode of Hoarders, the way your house SMELLS far out weighs how clean it actually is.  Trust me on this!  I have learned from years of experience.  So I was grateful last night after my husband cooked FISH to head over to my sisters for a Scentsy party!  (oh and btw Mr. Sweetheart, the fish was great, just really smelly)

I had a great time smelling all the wonderful to die for scents, seeing the new products, and chatting with other women!  My favorite part was my small niece (she is 2ish) who dragged me over and pointed and "chatted" at the Scenty buddy on the display.  Even without being able to understand her I knew exactly what she was saying " I want this".  It was just too cute.  I ended up buying one for my daughter.  She is 13 but actually squealed when I told that I had bought her one because I was so proud of her good grades this year (3.8 gpa!!)

This is the one I bought my daughter - she LOVES monkeys!

It was at the party that I decided to Share the love with all my new blogging Friends!  It has almost 4  weeks since I started really blogging and it has been such a positive experience!  So, In the spirit of sharing the love I'm giving one of you a Scentsy Buddy!

They have 6 different Buddies to choose from along with a Scent packet!  There is also a website your child can register their Buddy and play online with!

Since I cant give everyone a Buddy.  Here is what you need to do to enter:

Mandatory Entry:

Go to Scentsy consultants Stephanie & Sam at 2 Sassy Sisters and check out the Buddies!  Then come back and leave me a comment saying which Scentsy Buddy and Scent packet you would LOVE to receive!  Also please leave your email so I can notify you!

Additional Entries (leave a separate comment for each one please) :

* Follow my blog* 1 entry

*Grab my button* 1 entry

*Follow me on Facebook* 1 entry

*Make a Scentsy purchase with 2 Sassy Sisters* 3 entries

*Blog about this giveaway* 4 entries

My Giveaway to you will end October 21 at midnight.  I will use Random.org to draw a winner.          US Residents only.

I love Scentsy… the company in no way sponsored or is representative of this post.  I’m doing the giveaway out of the goodness of my heart to show you all how much I appreciate you!

Thanks Much and Good Luck!

Ghost Town

After spending the last couple days walking by and staring at my little village with a glimmer of an idea- I decided to do something about it!  I bought these little houses at the dollar store.  They sit up on my window in the kitchen.  (actually I kinda move them around).  I noticed that the backs were just blank!  oh yeah baby - totally ok for me to do something with!  I will then just turn them around when I want my cute little village back.

So I did.  I would have done a tutorial but LITERALLY all I did was turn them around and paint them with black, grey and yellow.  And not even very neatly I might add because I wanted them to look rough - they are haunted after all! 

I am thinking tho that they need a ghost or two on the sides or a tiny tombstone.   lol  oh I'm having too much fun!

Now I need to go find a cute idea for a Halloween plate!

** Reminder - I have a Scentsy Buddy Giveaway starting on Sept 30!  Be sure to drop by and check it out!

Skeleton Gourds all done!

3 more skeleton ghost gourds all done and waiting a varnish spray.  Yep, my whole morning!  At least they are almost done and ready to be picked up. 

Bones are drying in the oven.  Im off to my next project!

My Other Hobby

Since my projects today seem to all be in the final stages but not quite finished,  I thought I would show you a few photos of my other hobby.  Painting minitures.  I started when my son started to get into Warhammer 40,000 playing the minitures game.  It turns out that these minitures come grey and unpainted.  Really suprising considering how much they cost. 

Anyhow, I was then recruited to paint.  Here are a few of them...

Ultramarines

And Necrons

That is my lamp, flower pot, and tissue box in the distance to show you approximate size.  They take a while to paint, but like most parents know - I do it cause I love my son! 

Got to run  - have to go play Risk!

My busy Monday!

Oh My Goodness!  Am I the only mom who goes through this?  It's this moment on Monday morning right after all the kids are off to school.  Its like time stands still and I'm able to clearly see my house in a whole new light.  I think I must have spent the entire weekend with rose colored glasses with regards to my house.  Especially if all the kids are relaxed and happy. 

Until Monday morning. 

Then my eyes seem to pan from one side of the room to the other side, room by room taking in all the little messes the kids left behind, the dust that has been stirred up and settled and little paw prints all over the place from the dogs!

Oh the HORROR!

Not that the house was falling down on itself, but it really needed some TLC.  So I dug in and got to work.  I also have been base coating an order of 3 gourds and 2 more for my Etsy store (if they don't sell before I get them posted).  Plus I'm hoping to do a giveaway of a set of 3 of my "graveyard bones" mainly because my sisters want some and don't want to make them. lol oh well :)  Whats a sis to do!

Hopefully later I will have another post with some badly taken photos and a new Halloween project to share!

Happy Monday!  Please tell me Im not the only mom that deals with this!!

Libby's Dessert!

Libby has been wanting to practice a recipe that she will be making in Home Ec next week.  So Sweetheart ran to the store and bought her the supplies and she got to work. 

The tutorial for these is fairly simple.  Prepare rice crispy treats using Cocoa Krispies.  Once done scoop into buttered muffin tins and with buttered fingers shape into a bowl.  Chill.  You can then fill them with pudding or ice cream.  She choose chocolate pudding with chocolate sprinkles on top! 

A great desert recipe for a 13 year old to make!

They look so yummy!

Heritage Lace - great Halloween additions!

Since Halloween is at our house in a big way this year I have been searching the web for various ideas.  My kids have definte requests "less cute, more gore"  I am just not comfortable with TOO much gore.  I ran across a store and instantly fell in love with their Halloween valences, light toppers, and mantles.  Their name is,

Heritage Lace

I love their Halloween lace!  I cant decide which one I need to put on my mantle - the spiders or the bats.   SO cool!

I've got my eye's on you!

Im lookin at you!  ok just kidding.  I just wanted to share my Halloween eyeball lights that I made.  VERY ease and VERY quick - gotta love that!

All the materials you need are the ball lantern lights and green black and red acrylic paints.  Paint a large green circle and then a smaller black circle for the center of the eye.  Then using a smaller brush pain on the blood shot veins.  Easy!

You can then hang them anywhere.  I hung them down my stairs. - I plan on adding a garland as well so I will post as soon as I get it done!

Hope your enjoying your Saturday!



My Laundry Room

I think I have a love / hate relationship with my laundry room.  After seeing so many here decorate beautiful laundry rooms a while back, I decided enough is enough.  I went in to try to make the room a prettier place to work in.  It wasnt easy, and not even close to so many of the wonderful laundry rooms I have seen- but it was better.  My laundry room has one glaring problem that prevents me from doing much - space.  I have none.  It was and still is my biggest downfall in my house when I bought it.  hmmmm 5 bedrooms and a laundry room the size of a pea pod.  What were they thinking??

My biggest positive however is my washer/ dryers.  I have 2 of each.  They were a gift from my parents and I cant tell you enough how much I love them.  Seriously - I LOVE THEM.  It cuts my laundry down to half the time.  In my opinion - everyone should have 2 of each!  It just rocks.  Even with the machines taking up their space there isnt even any room to sort or pile ANY laundry.  I do hate that.

Anyhow, here is a photo of my laundry room.

Dont blink you might miss it.  Oh, and that is Sarah my resident Diva who I swear ran into the room when she realized I had a camera!

Here is one side of the room.

And here is the other!

So there ya have it!  I dont get it, but it is what it is!  I wrote this post because I'm going to link this to the laundry room link up in ALL it's embarrissing glory.  Oh well, its mine :)

** edited to add- I think it is soooooo funny that after I posted this, I had an advertisement at the bottom for a website linking you to local contractors who specialize in adding on rooms! ****

Halloween Bloody Weapon Garland tutorial

My husband probably thinks I have completely lost my mind.  Mua haaa (ok that is my evil serial killer laugh).  I have been working on a project for my fireplace in my kitchen.  Something EASY, FUN, and FAST for Halloween! 

Halloween bloody weapon garland!

I hope your not thinking I am some sort of sicko.  Remember I'm decorating for TEENAGERS now - more GORE less cute.  Just in case your dying (get it, dying - lol I kill me! ) to make one for yourself I thought I would show a quick tutorial:

Materials:

poster board (although I think I may cut out a set in think board so I can use them year after year)

Paints-  Blood red, black and grey

weapons shapes - I just downloaded pics from google images = easy cheesy

brush

string or twine

tape

1- take your weapons cutouts and well, cut them out! them trace them onto your poster board!

2-Cut the shapes out of the poster board!

3- paint the weapons a basic black and grey.  Grey is for the blade, black for the handle!

4- using a tissue "bloody" (with the red paint) your weapons.  Have fun with it - Kids would love doing this!  Ok, maybe not small children but my teens would!

5- lay your bloody weapons out to dry!

6- cut the length of string you need and then tape the string to the back of your weapons.  Then hang up.  Now your all set.  I did hang mine alittle lower because I want to put a vinyl Halloween wording in the center of my mantle.

The most adorable bentos ever!

Hello and Good morning everyone!  As my son and I sat in my office this morning waiting for the bus to pull up he asked me repeatedly to google star wars gourds.  He just knows that somewhere out there is a gourd painted like Darth Vader or the Emperor.  Since we had time I typed it in and we sat and looked.  Nope, no star wars gourds.  After I told him that he insisted that I should paint him a  star wars gourd.  Hmmm we will see. 

Anyhow after the bus came and things were quiet I sat here trying to wake up and energize over a cup of coffee this morning - so much to do, so little time. like always with moms.  I will admit I like to type in ideas into google and see what images pop up or where it takes me.  I know, kinda scary in the world of Internet and I do have to be careful.  Hint: don't click on the link "wanna see my gourds" and its a naked woman holding gourds over her private areas"  not that I did, I'm just warning you that it didn't look good.

Well as I did I came across a website that I wanted to share.  Its From a site called Anna the red.  It has the coolest bento gallery!  I didn't even know what a bento was when my kids were little.  I wish I did - some of these are sooooo cute.  And now, I'm afraid if I made some of these for my teenagers, well lets just say my moment is lost.  I thought I would share a few photos....

These bentos are created to help get kids to eat healthy food and have fun.  I never thought about going to all this work.  It makes me regret the "eat this because I said so tactic I used" 

Look how cute this is?  I dont know that I have the time or energy to come up with and prepare something like this. 

This one is just adorable.  I plan on scrap booking this so that when Im older and senility kicks in Ill look through my scrapbooks to remember and see that oh yes I did this every day for my daughter when she was little.  Good times, good times. 

This last one is probably the one I most would have tried (if I had known about bentos) way back then.  Its cute and looks nutricious if not alittle more work than normal.  I dont really remember garnishing many of my kids lunches.  Oh the shame of it!

Anyhow, go check it out for fun - they have a ton of cute bentos that look just to pretty to eat!



blog construction and finished gourd

My blog is currently under some construction.  ( My brother is helping me - he is really good at this) So if you click on and things are changing dont worry. 

Also, unfortunately last night the gourd I made for my sister was STOLEN.  Actually not really stolen as it was really just my other sister grabbing it and running to her car and throwing a check out the window - Really that is just what she did.  After stressing about it my other sister called and I told her I was working on a new gourd today.  I think it is pretty much done.

She needs to pick it up before this one is STOLEN.  (my mother was eyeing the other one from last night so odds are high).  See lol this is why I dont have many gourds yet for my Etsy site - Im a tryin!

workin away on gourds & a cool link

I have spent this morning roughing out 2 new gourds.  They are really at the rough stage right now but hopefully soon I will hit that turning point where they start to look like something cute.

A hippy witch and a skelleton ghost!



Hope everyone is having a great WEDNESDAY!  We have having friends over for dinner so eventually Ill have to stop crafting/ painting and get the house ready for visitors! Oh and my daughter has a volleyball game today so I will head over to the school to cheer her on.  (very intense 15 mins lol)

Oh - I found this website that has a TON of cool and fun Halloween stuff.  I think I need about 5000 in credit at the store! WOW I just Love Halloween!
http://www.frightcatalog.com/Indoor-Decorations.html

Shrunken heads in flasks!  Why do I totally think I need these?  I do tho.

Started my Etsy shop!

I spent most of yesterday and last night (with the help of my brother) setting up my Etsy account and getting it linked into my blog.  I want to add more items hopefully today but I only added 2 last  night as a trial run.  For a long time I just gave my crafts and gourds away and eventually just sold to friends and family so an Etsy shop is exciting! 

I also worked a bit on my Halloween decor.  My niece came over and kept saying that it was cool so that was fun. 

We added bloody plates in the kitchen about the window.

I also wanted to add this picture of our baby - our cocker spaniel puppy.  She sat at the door for the longest time last night because my daughter went outside.  She just sat there pointing at the door waiting for my daughter to return.

It was too cute!

My newest gourd and Halloween decor

Well here he is...

I hope you like him!

I also took a few quick pics of my Halloween decor.

My Halloween tree - I still have to hang the skeleton lights, they aren't working for some reason and I'm hoping Sweetheart can fix them.

My kitchen centerpiece - I have teenagers.  They do not want anything cute anymore and keep asking me to add more gore to it!  I have several more gore projects to do!

My resident entry way ghost.  My daughter took this one and then thought it looked like we were being haunted so I had to keep it. LOL

Anyhow lots more to do.  Unfortunately I keep getting busy with other projects and mishaps that happen along the way.  I will post more pics soon.  Plus my next Halloween tutorial is hopefully done soon - I cant wait to share!

Take care all and enjoy your evening!

Happy Monday & a peek of my latest gourd

Good Morning everyone out in blogland!  I was up bright and early today so kitchen is clean, laundry is well on its way and I'm sitting here working on a few more Halloween gourds.  Here is a peek on one I'm working on right now...

He isn't even close to done but I thought I would share anyhow. He is already sold so I want to get him right and also done quickly lol.

I also got a great idea for Halloween that I want to make up later today - I was just missing one of the mats. I am hoping it turns out and if so Ill make a tutorial and post it later. I am loving Halloween, Fall, and actually Monday isn't turning out so bad!

Sideswipped by a bad dog haircut

I was all set to get the house cleaned and finish up my Halloween decor.  At least enough of it to take a few photos and create a post.  I hope to add to my Halloween decor all the up til the day of.  BUT, I got distracted and thought that I could quickly and painlessly give our cocker spaniel a haircut.  BOY WAS I WRONG!  All her long hair was way over due for a cut, my clippers were dull and she was very uncooperative!  After all that and a bath I layed her down to blow dry her while I brushed out all the tangles - She was FULL of them.  She seemed to like it tho because she fell asleep on my lap.  Just when she was looking puffy and totally cute and bow ready ...

 She rolled over and puked all over my leg, her leg, her ear, my rug ....ugh need I go on.  I quickly washed her off and threw her outside.  Now I'm completely grossed out, my bathroom is a mess, I stripped down and threw on sweats but I wont feel right until I take a shower.  I'm completely derailed.  I think Sweetheart knew I was at the end of my rope when I came in and told him NEVER AGAIN!  There is a reason why I take my baby to petsmart and pick her up all perfect and wonderful.  No mess, no fuss.  So dam worth all the money in the world.  He didn't protest at all.

Oh well, Ill go jump in the shower and try and regroup.  I need to find my Happy place.

Pictures from my sisters open house!

Today Sweetheart and I went down to my little sister Karen's open house.  My sister is a realtor for a development call the River District in Eagle, Idaho.  There are patio homes and regular homes with small yards that back up against the water.  They have that warehouse district feel that I love - they are soo cool.  I took out my phone and tried to take a few pictures to show you - I know you will love them as well!

Here is the front of the cottage house style.  Isn't it just so cute! And yes that is Sweetheart standing guard while my sister ran to the clubhouse for something. 

Here is a side view - It has the most amazing balcony on the side.

The entry - I would love this for my kids altho I fear it would always be messy with coats and things!

The kitchen was to die for - I'm sorry I didn't get a better picture of it!

The pantry door is a chalkboard! I want this!

Yes I took a picture of inside the pantry.  But with so many bloggers decorating this space in so many good ways I thought I would share this one - isn't it so lovely?

The boys room

Artwork in the hallway I love!

And here is my lil sis.  She is a wonderful realtor who goes way WAY out of her way to help her clients find the home of their dreams.  She goes above and BEYOND!  But only because she cares so much!