I hinted about it and gave a couple sneak-peek shots in this post.
Here’s the final product…a personalized photo album that I made for my SIL Ali and her soon-to-arrive (in January) 3rd little girl, Ensley Grace.
I’ve been waiting for the perfect reason to use this fabric!
I love adding names to the front of albums. There will be no mistaking to whom this book belongs!
Satin ribbon tie closures:
The back cover. The paste pages and the photo pages both coordinate with the cover fabric.
Remember the paper pinwheels from Day 5? Here they are in action!
Small ones adorned the mantel:
Large ones hung in the dining room windows around the snack table:
Come back tomorrow and see the gift I made for my SIL and her baby.
Today has been a fun day. This (very chilly) morning, I ran in a 5k race with my husband Andrew, his brother Jacob, and two of their sisters, Katie and Erin.
It was my first official race since April 2009, when I did the OKC Memorial Half-Marathon. Being pregnant and then having a newborn sort of forced running to the back burner, but now I’m back after it. Given how little I’ve run in the past several months, I was satisfied with my time, (31:41), which is my best in recent history.
Running aside, this weekend is a busy, fun-filled one!
My SIL Ali’s baby shower is tomorrow, and I needed a card. Luckily, I have nearly as many scrapbooking doohickeys as Hobby Lobby itself, so it was easy to find things to use.
Here’s what I came up with in about 10 minutes. I wish the photo were better, but I’m pressed for time right now:
An acrylic tile reading “Baby Girl” is the focal point, surrounded by pink circles and swirls.
Tomorrow I’ll show details from the shower as well as the gift I made for Ali and her baby girl.
This Sunday, my husband’s side of the family is celebrating all those who have fall birthdays.
One of his Aunt Cristi’s gift requests is new music she can listen to while she works out. Since I am a big fan of music AND exercise, I put together a disc full of tracks I think she’ll enjoy.
For today’s art, I used old magazines and scrapbook paper to make a collage for the CD cover.
Which way to the gun show? 
Made this sign for a baby shower this weekend. Besides taking out the trash, it’s about all I “accomplished” today. But I DID have lots of fun with my baby boy, who is 20 weeks old today!
Each year for Christmas, my husband’s side of the family draws names for gift-giving (there are 25 of us!). I’ve offered to organize the drawing this year, and it’s going to take place this Sunday.
I used this as an opportunity to play around with doodling and hand-lettering. Over the years, I’ve seen multiple examples of “color-splotching” instead of precise coloring, so I tried that today, too.
Here is the entire set as well as a few of my favorites:
After trimming the slips, I used a wooden skewer to roll each one into a tube. That way, no one can peek! I also marked the slips for the kids with red marker so they wouldn’t get mixed in with the adults’ names.
Granted, the drawing ‘buckets’ are nothing fancy, but now each family member can see which slip they are drawing without knowing who’s name they are getting.
I will also be emailing out a Christmas Survey this year. Each family member will fill out their “Wish List” and Reply All. That way, the secret of who drew who STAYS a secret (no need for covert spouse-interviewing operations this year!)
The list will also be a great reference throughout 2011 as we celebrate family birthdays.
Does your family have any fun holiday traditions? Do tell!
Today’s project: paper pinwheels! I’ve been wanting to make them since my friend Evie posted a tutorial on her blog.
The white one is about 9″ in diameter and the large one is about 18″ in diameter.
I plan to make several more, plus black and pink ones (and patterned paper ones as well) to be used for decor at an upcoming party. I’ll post another pic once they are all completed!
It’s always a pleasure to get a new client via referral. The following cake was requested by Therese, a friend of Amy’s.
Therese’s daughter Aden was having a birthday and wanted a leopard print cake. So, I set out to find a great pattern I could recreate in royal icing.
I spent several hours piping icing into perfect leopard-like shapes. My shapes are on the left, the pattern I studied is on the right:
Once the spots dried, I iced a 12″ two-layer chocolate cake with pink icing. I then added the birthday phrase, a beaded border, and the leopard spots.
I would loved to see how these spots would look on a tiered cake!
Detail shot of the spots: Outlined in 100% thickness royal icing and filled with a looser version of the same icing to make a ‘pillowy’ look.
Happy Birthday, Aden! I hope it was a great one!!
A while back, the lovely Felicia asked me to make cupcakes for a baby shower. A friend of hers at work was expecting a baby girl, and the whole office wanted to celebrate.
I made 48 cupcakes: two dozen vanilla and two dozen chocolate. The guest of honor loves cream cheese icing, so that was my frosting of choice. The project pretty much invaded my kitchen for the whole day as I got an assembly line going.
For every dozen, I made 6 chocolate and 6 vanilla with the same topping.
White swirl with pink sugar crystals.
Pink swirl with white nonpareils.
White iced with pink sugar pearls and pink jumbo heart sprinkle.
And pink sugar-crystal-coated with a white jumbo heart sprinkle.
I lined some Xerox paper box lids with heavy-duty foil so Felicia could easily transport the cupcakes to her office.
They all looked so cozy next to their cupcake neighbors.
And, being a lover of all things bulk, it makes my heart smile to see mass quantities of anything, especially cupcakes.
I LOVE LOVE LOVE the color of the hot pink ones.
All in a day’s work!
Want to know the upside to doing cupcakes instead of a regular cake at a shower or party?
1: You can have several flavors.
2. You can get various designs.
3: You don’t have to guess on serving size
4: You don’t need utensils or plates (which saves the hostess money!)
In September of 2009, I started a cupcake adventure. If you haven’t read about it yet, you can do so here.
***
With Valentine’s Day just 48 hours away, why not whip up a batch of these for your sweetheart?
I started by combining all the dry ingredients.
The filling was made from cream cheese, a dab of sugar, and a few tablespoons of maraschino cherry syrup. I wish I had gotten a photo of this after I’d gotten the lumps worked out! Kinda looks like pink cottage cheese. Eww.
Dry ingredients were mixed together with the wet ones to form the batter.
And sour cream provided the moisture.
Mmm. Lookin’ good so far!
Bake right up, you little loveys!
A pretty pretty batch. Fairly uniform, which is good! I must be learning a thing or two now that I’ve made about 30 batches. 
Each cupcake was ‘cored’ to make room for the filling.
A teaspoon of the cream cheese filling as well as a pitless (that’s important) maraschino cherry filled in the hole.
And the top plug was replaced.
I did that a dozen more times and voila! A set of filled cupcakes ready to be iced!
The icing used the remainder of the cream cheese filling, plus some powdered sugar and some more maraschino cherry syrup.
How pretty! You could stop there and people would still be delighted to try them. But why stop there?!
I added a little cocoa powder to a mesh strainer (you DEFINITELY want to do this over the sink!)
And lightly dusted each cupcake with a slight tap of cocoa (this takes some practice…some got a heavier dusting than others).
Since these were for my cousin’s birthday and not for Valentine’s Day, I wrote him a message on the serving plate.
After being dusted, each cupcake was topped with another cherry. Aren’t they just so cute?!
If this doesn’t scream “VALENTINE’S DAY!”, I don’t know a dessert that would.
I mean, look at that cherry! The cherry alone is gorgeous enough, but then look what’s under it!
And what’s under it tastes extra, extra yummy. Ask me how I know.
