Don't Throw Those Wine Bottles Away!

The first of two bridal showers I am helping with this year is just around the corner - my younger brother's fiance, who is very anti-bridal shower, will be tortured...err, showered in about a month. She wanted something a little less traditional, so we're going with more of a cocktail party-style shower.

We're doing really cute wine glass favors (post to follow...once we make them and I have a photo), and so we wanted to use wine bottles for centerpieces. Of course I can't just use plain wine bottles, so I scoured Pinterest and found A MILLION fun things to do. I limited myself to three ideas: a frosted look from Mark Montano, a spray painted personalized one from Pure and Noble, and one covered in yarn from Etsy (they used beer bottles but I loved the way it looked).

Unfortunately, I picked the windiest day of my life to go outside and spray paint, but you get the idea...

For the first one I used some spray adhesive at top and bottom, and then just wrapped the yarn around the bottle. I was sitting and after I finished, I realized that I should've stood up and been looking down on it. I think if I was standing it would've been a little tighter and neater looking, but not too shabby for a first attemp.

For the second, I just wrapped rubber bands around the bottle and used a pearl gray frosted glass spray paint - I used thin and thick rubberbands, and the thick ones definitely look best. Next time I make these I would definitely only use thick. It would also look great on a votive or something you could put a candle in!

For the third one I used a hot glue gun to write the word "love." Once the glue dries you can peal off some of the little strings so it looks cleaner. Then I just spray painted the bottle with watermelon-colored paint.

Wind was not my friend today, but I wanted to take advantage of L's naptime and send a photo around to the bridesmaids to get their thoughts. Hopefully they like them! Otherwise I'm going glitter...I'm pretty sure L will sign on to help with that one!

"Skinny" Nuggets? Yes please!

Sometimes I don't know if I should save things to my "foodie" board or my "kids" board, but this is one I saved to both just in case - homeade, baked, "skinny" chicken nuggets! They looked DELISH so I clicked over and was brought to a site called skinnytaste.com. Check out the link for the full recipe...

L really loves chicken nuggets, but there's just something about the weird shape and not really knowing for sure what's inside. So for me, it was definitely worth giving these a try. The recipe called for whole wheat breadcrumbs, but I didn't have them on hand so I just used regular ones. I just used olive oil spray to grease a baking sheet, cut up some chicken breasts into bit sized pieces, dredged the chicken with olive oil, and then covered them in a mix of Italian-seasoned breadcrumbs, panko breadcrumbs, grated parmesan cheese and some pepper. Then I sprayed a touch of the olive oil spray over top, and threw them in the oven. Bake for 10 minutes, flip and bake for 4 more and THAT'S IT! No eggs, no flour, and we had cripsy, delicious chicken nuggets:

These were so easy to make - literally 20 minutes from start to finish. And they are so good. The second they came out of the oven I had to give them a try. Crispy on the outside, moist on the inside - truly perfect. And the best part was that they even tasted great reheated the next day (when L enjoyed hers).

"Skinny" chicken nuggets are definitely a new house staple!

Glitter, glitter everywhere!

In honor of Valentine's Day yesterday, I decided to do some arts and crafts with L when I got home from work. I started to cut out a heart, and L declared "No, mama, glitter!" (I love that she loves glitter as much as I do...to poor hubby's dismay). So naturally I pulled out the glitter and remembered a cool pin I had grabbed...

I have seen quite a few of these glitter jars, often used for time outs, which I really dislike since they are so fabulous. But then I found this one on a blog called Chasing Cheerios, which she called Starry Night and she uses it more as a calming tool. Since L LOVES stars, I thought she would really enjoy it.

This blog said to fill the mason jar with warm water, than add in blue glitter, glitter glue and clear clue to help the swirl. We did this one together first, adding blue and silver glitter and glitter glue, and I all too quickly super glued the top on. This took about 4 minutes and the fun was kind of over. It was also a little cloudy, so I wondered if I shouldn't have used the glitter glue, but supposedly that was what caused the 'swirl' of glitter.

So since we still had plenty of time left in our evening, we decided to make another one. Without the guide of the starry night jar, L was free to choose her own glitter colors. I guess L was inspired by our holiday so she started out with pink, red and silver.

This time, we started with water again, but tried baby oil with the glitter instead of glue. We were not impressed, so we dumped it out and started over. Next we added some of the clear glue to the glitter (no glitter glue), but the glitter was just kind of sticking together. So we dumbed it out and started over (reason #27 why it's really important to have a ton of glitter in the house). For the third time, L also expanded her glitter choice and added some of every color - she really enjoyed tapping the glitter in (some did actually make it into the jar...some on her, the counter, the floor, and me, of course). We only had glitter and water in it this time and L really liked this the best, so we capped it off and she was really happy with it!

L was really proud of her glitter jars and couldn't wait to show her daddy when he got home! We call the blue one her starry night jar, and the multi-colored one is her rainbow jar. At breakfast this morning I was told it was time for rainbow jar, and then this evening she remembered the starry night jar, so we brought it upstairs to bed so we could sing "Twinkle, Twinkle" with it. Needless to say, this craft was a big hit and we spent almost an hour with it! And in the spirit of Valentine's Day, hubby even forgave us for tracking glitter all through the house :-)

My First Pinterest Purchase!

So, as I mentioned, E, my 22 year-old stepdaughter, is planning her wedding. This is actually what even made me join Pinterest in the first place. She's been planning her wedding on Pinterest for quite some time (although I do believe the groom-to-be is unaware of the pre-engagement planning LOL).

I obviously wanted to help her in any way that I could, so I hopped on Pinterest to get in on the action. And my world will never be the same! One of the first things she fell in love with was this black tutu dress she pinned:

She wanted this for her flowergirl dresses because her colors are black and white, and she's accenting with Tiffany blue. I love the idea of the idea of the dress, but was really hesitant about flowergirls in black (especially since I don't love L in black). BUT, it's her wedding, and I've been really supportive and helping make sure that this is the wedding she wants. Through the powers of Pinterest, I found that a store called Atutudes on Etsy had made this couture tutu dress, and low and behold, I found the perfect solution...

The Tiffany Box Tutu Dress from Atutudes on Etsy! (You can check it out here:http://www.etsy.com/listing/88098673/atutudes-tiffany-box-tutu-dress?utm_source=Pinterest&utm_medium=PageTools&utm_campaign=Share). E was completely ecstatic over it, it matched the box perfectly (she literally keeps a Tiffany box in her purse at all times just in case), and she wanted it! So I ordered three dresses for our three little flower girls. AND, they arrived within two weeks and really are perfect. L wouldn't take it off!

Moral of the story - you can find anything through Pinterest and make every Bride (and stepmother-of-the-bride) happy!

"Isn't that Pinteresting??"

Like millions of other people, I am obsessed with Pinterest. It's pretty much become my favorite past time ever (besides the obvious of course...I am a mommy after all). There are a ton of reasons to be Pinterest, and I have a number of boards - weddings (two really important weddings in 2012 - my younger brother in May and my stepdaughter, E, in October!); millions of ideas for crafts, birthday themes and things to do with my amazing and adorable 2-1/2 year old daughter, L; African-American hairstyles that I dream of mastering for L; recipes for all kinds of fun things, including gluten-free stuff for my mom; and of course anything that just happens to catch my fancy.

It's fun to explore and be inspired by what everyone else out there is doing - there are millions of people with great ideas, and Pinterest is the greatest place to share/learn/discover! But, for me, the very best thing about Pinterest is all the wonderful ways I have found to spend quality time with L. We're all so busy and have so many responsibilities, that it's really easy to throw the TV on and call it a day. But that's not the mommy I want to be, and Pinterest gives me the ideas I need to keep things fun and creative. (Don't worry - I only Pinterest when L's sleeping, so it's only enhancing mommyhood, not distracting from it LOL)

So, I decided to start this blog to share with others all the fun things I find and try - regardless of the outcomes....sometimes I don't even think it matters what the result will be! I hope you enjoy and find something pinteresting!