Easter





I felt like Easter really snuck up on me this year. I had loads of grand plans, but in the end whenever Easter is in March-most of my plans are not going to happen. There were Easter baskets and we even managed to make clues in hidden eggs leading to B’s hidden basket (per his request) Of course we did this at 11:30pm the night before Easter, but we didn’t forget and he seemed to really love running all over the house finding clues. Just look at the face he made when he posed with his basket!
I felt like I didn’t look very festive on Easter (I was wearing black and pink) so I made some silly hair barrettes and a brooch to wear while everyone else was finishing with their showers/getting dressed for the day.
We headed to Tom’s parents house in the afternoon for an Easter lunch and I wanted to bring french macarons. I had the idea that I would make them the day before (you might remember that Jessee gave us all a macaron lesson at her house) but its not as easy as you might think and after 6 failed attempts I decided the last purple batch was good enough. Baking macarons are definitely a talent!!
I’ll have lots of posts for you this week, as I have a bunch of exciting things to share…and that is surprisingly not an April Fool’s joke ;) Oh and a note about the baskets—I made those back in 2009 with the info found here. They work great for re-using year after year, and since they are fabric they fold up and take up less room then saving a traditional basket.

Cat Party

cat party
cat party
Yesterday was B’s Cat themed party, and it was a pretty silly event. The cake was a litter box cake (i’m sure you’ve seen these before, but always entertaining!) B isn’t a big cake fan so he wanted a brownie cake. I bought a new tub type dish and cat scoop (which was just for show) and ran them through the dishwasher. Then I made a big pan of brownies. When cool the brownies were turned over into the tub, and frosted with chocolate frosting. Then the litter is made from running some of the vanilla sandwich cookies in the food processor with just a little green food coloring. It really ends up looking like litter! To top if off you heat a few tootsie rolls in the microwave for about ten seconds and shape. Turns out very realistically, and people might be reluctant to eat it. Though once you cut it up and start putting the brownies on plates, it’s a lot easier to stomach.

We made cat shaped pizzas, and had funny names for all the foods like “hair balls” for cheese balls, “catnip dip” for spinach dip etc.
cat party
cat party
cat party
We only played one game because the kids mostly wanted to play out back with a bunch of nerf guns & silly string, which was fine by me. Tom made a bunch of balloon animal cats, and it was mostly lots of us adults sitting around chatting it up.
cat party
cat party
Instead of regular goodie bags I had the idea to use up some canvas totes I had leftover from a previous crafternoon. I scanned a kit-cat clock box for the image and then printed them out two per page onto printable iron on paper. I always pick the one designed for dark fabrics even when ironing onto a light color, because it just seems to be a nicer thicker iron on. Then I ironed one onto each bag, and made a bunch of silly cat pins using vintage images of cats. I figured if the kids got bored at the party they could make a bunch of their own pins, but we never even had to do that. Instead the tote bags worked out well for collecting pinata loot, and storing their prizes from the game.
Even once the actual party was done there was a sleepover with a viewing of The Cat Returns so the cat theme carried on without even meaning to!

ten years old


Yesterday my little guy turned ten years old. Double digits and there is no denying that this last decade has flown by in the blink of an eye.
I can’t believe how grown up he is, yet I am not quite ready to share him with the world. You’ll have to take my word for it when I tell you he is one handsome fella. For now I will keep him for just us alone, because we will blink again and he will be an adult out in the world and all over the internet like we all are now a days.

We celebrated by going out to dinner and then to see Oz at the VIP theater with the big cushy reclining seats. His cat party is tomorrow so we’ve got a little more celebrating to do.

DIY Card Valentines

playing card valentines - mypapercrane.com
Playing Card Valentines DIY - mypapercrane.com
We got a head start on B’s Valentines this year, which is great because Valentine’s is sneaking up on us quick! B is in 4th grade this year, so I checked when we were at the store to see if wanted to buy any of the Valentines they had for sale. I don’t want to be the mom forcing my kid to make a Valentine if all he wants to do is buy Phineas & Ferb cards for his friends (because just to be clear I will buy the hell out of some store valentines if my guy wanted) but he said he still wanted to make his own, and that he thought the store ones were “boring”. So I threw out a few ideas and this is the one he really liked. He loves drawing faces, and his noses are my favorite. He has two more years in school for Valentine parties and every year I wonder if it will be the last one he wants to make Valentines, but he is still going strong!
He is almost ten, so he was able to do almost every part of these valentines all on his own, our glue gun is really hot so I helped with glue. If your kids are younger (or don’t have hot glue experience) then you can do the glueing and they can draw the faces and write the “to’s and froms” on the back. The supplies are super simple too…
playing card valentines DIY - mypapercrane.com
Supplies:
-Valentine Face PDF, I had ours printed on cardstock, but if you didn’t want to print out faces you can just cut hearts from construction paper
-glue, I felt like hot glue works best, and dries quick but you can use whatever you like
-pipe cleaners, we did red but you can use any color
-pen, for drawing on the faces…you can use wiggly eyes too!
-playing cards, we found ours at the dollar tree. two packs for $1 and we found two different sizes
playing card valentines DIY - mypapercrane.com
1. First we separated the cards into two piles, we wanted to use all red cards for the card on top, and the black ones for the card that the legs and arms are glued to. You could just use all the heart cards if you want them to be extra festive.
2. For regular sized playing cards we cut a pipe cleaner in half and glued one half down for arms (on a black face up card) and the other half for the legs. We used half a pipe cleaner for the smaller cards.
playing card valentines DIY - mypapercrane.com
3. Then add more glue over the top of the arms, legs and card, and press the red card down and hold it in place for a few seconds.
playing card valentines DIY - mypapercrane.com
4. Next cut out your hearts and draw some faces, then glue the heads on. You can write you message on the back of the cards with a sharpie pen, or even write on the back of the heads.
playing card valentines DIY - mypapercrane.com
Heehee I loved the little face he made, and I didn’t even notice until I was editing the photos, it made me crack up! You can have the little pipe cleaner hands hold a piece of candy (or maybe a super tiny playing card?) We thought it would be amazing if we could find little chocolate roses for them to hold (painting the roses red!) and are considering making our own since we still have some time. If we do i’ll report back with some photos.
**Personal use means non-commercial use of the valentines including copies and print outs for yourself, your personal crafts/scrapbooking and to give to friends. The valentines may not be used in any way whatsoever in which you charge money, collect fees, or receive any form of remuneration. The valentines may not be used in advertising, and they may not be resold.***