Book Giveaway Winner

The winner of the book giveaway is: Kathryn   

Congratulation to you Kathryn you are the winner of this months Giveaway. Enjoy your copy of Dinner with a Perfect Stranger by David Gregory.  Check out her blog at: http://cumminslife.blogspot.com/

Don't worry if you were not the winner of the giveaway there will be more giveaways coming soon.

Kathryn, please contact me with you e-mail so that I can get your address and mail the book to you.   

Elephant theme baby shower: The Cake and Games

Here is the elephant cake that we used for the Elephant themed baby shower.  I do have to confess that I am not the one that made this cake.  The Husband of the Mom To Be is the one that made this cake.  It was a really blessing to us for him to make this cake for his wife's baby shower.    If you wanted to check out their blog  click here. I do have to tell you that not only does this cake look awesome, but it tasted great too!

Here is the elephant cake I tried to make.  I frosted it battle ship gray because that is the color of a real elephant, but I don't think most people want to eat something that is gray.  To make the cake I used a 9x3 cake pan for the head and two small oval cake pans for the ears (you could use one large round cake and cut it in half to make the ears).

This cake looks like Babar the Elephant

I am not sure if the cake progression was better or worse as I added things to it.  It is really hard to get the trunk to look realistic.

Baby Game

Here is one of the games we played.  It is called the Candy Game. It is a fun game that guest will love.  All you need is a poster board, a marker (I used the Circut to cut out the letters) and candy.  Hold the board up so the guest can see it (without the candy showing.  I only put the candy up here so that you can see what candy goes with what word.  You will want to hide the candy from the guest.)

Then one at a time reveal the scrambled word to the guest and have them try to guess what candy it is.  You can read them a cue that I have written below.  The first guest to unscramble the word gets the candy.  Guest love this game because they get to eat the prize!

 Candy Game

Example your hint:  What are epidurals? The candy is lifesavers

Baby’s little laughter:   snicker

What do you call mom, dad and baby or if  you find out your having triples:    Three Musketeers

Breasting feeding: Milky Way

The hospital bill:   100 grand

What parents do when they find out if the baby is a boy or a girl: a shopping spree

What you never want to give a baby under one:  A bit-o-honey

Mom’s tummy after delivery: Jelly Belly

What mom says to Dr. Henry when he gives her an epidural:  Oh Henry

A contraction:  Crunch

Mom would not want someone that has these hands holding the baby: butterfingers

This is a very simple game, but we had tons of fun doing it.  Sometime it is hard to know who unscrambled the word first, so if you want you can come up with a tie breaker.

Baby Blessing

We also had a place where guest could write a blessing for the baby.  I know that the Mommy to Be and Baby E were both blessed by all the guest at this shower.

Here is one of God's blessing for all babies:


 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart;  I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.” Jeremiah 1:5 (NIV)


Amen!

Elephant Theme Baby Shower: The Party

This is the second part of the Elephant Baby Shower that a friend and I put together.  It was so much fun!  

This is some of the decor that I made for the elephant theme baby shower.

  

This is the Mom to Be and her aunt.  They are looking at the wonderful cake that the mom to be's husband made for her baby shower (to check out the cake see the Elephant Theme Baby Shower: The Cake and Games post).

 Friends catching up on what is going on in their lives.

 This is everyone eating the food we prepared for the baby shower.  We had a veggie tray, fruit tray, and a meat and cheese tray.  We also had a cream cheese chipolata dip with crackers.

This is the Mommy to Be opening up some presents that a guest gave her.  She is not finding out the sex of the baby so most of the clothes she received were yellow.  To learn more about her you can check out her blog at: http://cumminslife.blogspot.com/

Sorry I do not have more photos to share with you .  My camera was not charged and ran out during the party. So sad.

Elephant theme baby shower: The Decor

One of my good friends is having a baby,  and another friend and I wanted to bless her with a baby shower.  The first thing we had to do was to come up with a theme.  Since each of her children has a first name that begins with the first letter of the alphabet in order, we knew that this baby would have a name that begins with "E".  My friend also said that she likes elephant items for her 5th baby.  When you put those two together we knew that we had our theme: Elephants and Baby E.

The first thing that we did was to find plates that we liked.  The Mom to be did not know if she was having a boy or a girl which made it more challenging to find a neutral elephant theme.  We decided to go with a pink and blue theme with yellow as an accent color. I found these plates at  1st wishes website.

Plates and Napkins

 One of my other friends was so gracious to let me borrow her Cricut to help me come up with  these wonderful decoration, but if you don't have a Cricut or a friend that will let you borrow one like me, you still can do most of these decorations.
To make the napkins holders I cut out 25 elephants using the Cricut's Animal Kingdom cartridge and glued them to a small strip of paper.  I rolled up the napkins a one end and placed the napkins holder around the napkins.  I think the napkin holders really give it an elegant feeling.

Decorations

This banner can be time consuming, but it looks so cute I could not help myself from trying to make it.  I used my Stampin' up big shot machine to cut out the squares and the letters.  For the elephants I just cut out one of the elephants from each paper plate and glued it to a square piece of paper.

Wall Hangings 

We put up lots of balloons in pink, blue and white.  We also had two elephant balloons that went with the plate theme. We played soft lullaby music in the background.  On the right of the Television  I made a wall hanging that says "Baby E".  I gave it to the Mom To Be after the shower so that she can hang it in the baby's room.  On the left of the televison I had two wall hangings of elephants cut out of pink and blue card stock using the Cricut.  

For the water bottles, I cut out elephants to 1 1/2 inch on the Circut.  Using tweezers, I carefully placed googlies eyes using a hot glue gun.  Then I glued them to strips of pink or blue paper.  To make sure that they did not fall down the bottle I put a small dot of hot glue on the back of the paper and the water bottle.  

Centerpiece

Centerpiece on the kitchen opening:  I had to get creative. to make the top so I used the Big Shot machine to cut out the scalloped square and the smaller embossed square (to embossed the square I used a stamp'n up embossed folder).  For the pink elephant I cut out a 1 1/2 inch elephant (with the Cricut using the Animal Kingdom set).  The letter were also cut out using the Cricut. ( I also made another side to this so that you have something to look at from both sides.  I glued both sides together  putting a dowel between the squares.  I placed a yellow ribbon on the dowel and tied it in a bow (the bow was some how shifted). The dowel was placed in the stand.  To make the stand I used the Cricut.  To make the stand stand up I placed pennies in the bottom and covered them with pink tissue paper.  The two elephants on either side of the stand are from The Little People zoo collection (one is my child's and one is a friend's child's).  It took a long time to make, but I think that it is really cute and adds to the overall theme.

Centerpiece for the Table : I used the same base as the kitchen centerpiece only I used pink paper, with a blue "E" on it.  For each of the four dowels I cut a square paper.  On each square paper I put, "E", "is" , "for" and a cut out of an elephant.  To make sure that he dowels stayed in place, I filled the base with peanuts.

We filled this box up with M&Ms for the guest to munch on.

Favors

Last but not least, what is a party without favors.  To make these I used the Cricut's Tags, Bags Boxes & More set.  They are the cutest size; just right to put a bite size candy bar into.  One one side they have a blue or pink elephant and on the other side they have "Baby E" written on them.

PS To see the  Elephant cake check out Elephant theme baby shower: The Cake and Games

School Days are Here Again

Today is the day that all the kids go back to school.  It has been a fun summer, but I am ready for them to go back to school and back to learning.
My oldest is now in 7th grade, and I cannot help but ask myself "when did that happen".  I cannot believe that I am so close to being a parent of a teenager.  He did not want the summer to end, but is happy to see his friends again.
Mare Bear is going into the 3rd grade today.  Although it doesn't really matter because she is in a life skill class and has had the same teacher for 3 years.  She was so happy to go back to school, see her teacher and play with her friends.  She also enjoys riding the bus and was so happy when she saw the bus rounding the corner of our street this morning.
Little Man is really going to miss his brother and sister.  It will be so hard for him not knowing where they are, or when they will get home.   However, it will be nice to spend some quality time with my Little Man.

Little Man is 11 months

I was looking at the calandar today and realized that it is the 10th of August.  That means that it is only one month until my Little Man 's 1st birthday.  I am already planning the party.  I have picked out the theme and ordered the plates.  I am working on an idea for goodies bag.  I am not a fan of goodies bags, but a small one with some treats inside might be nice.  It is so hard to believe that my little man is 11 months today.  He is so big, and he has learned so much in just one year.  I cannot wait to plan his first birthday party.  It is not just a celebration of him turning one , but also a celebration of how far we all have come from that moment in the delivery room to him walking and talking.

You're Never to Young for Chores

My Oldest is always complaining why my other two children do not have chores.  I have tried to explain to him that they are not capable of actually doing chores.  You see my daughter has Rett Syndrome and is not able to speak or have purposeful use of her hands.  (check out her page to learn more about Rett Syndrome).  She is not able to hold her own drink much less wipe down a table.  As for my youngest, well he is only 10 months old.  What chores could he possible do? Well, more then I thought he could.  My Oldest son caught this video of my youngest sweeping the floor.   He is only 10 months old, but man can he work a broom mop.  I guess his first chore will be to sweep the kitchen with the mop broom.  Now if I could just teach him to vacuum! (just kidding).

Book Giveaway: Dinner with a Perfect Stranger

Book Giveaway: Closed

If you have had a chance to read my book review of the book Dinner with a Perfect Stranger by David Gregory you know that I think that it is a thought provoking book.  I also said that you should read the book and then give it to a friend. So I am practicing what I preach.   Since WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Company has so graciously give me another free copy of Dinner with a Perfect Stranger by David Gregory, I am going to pass it along to one of my readers.  This Giveaway will be for one NEW copy of the book Dinner with a Perfect Stranger by David Gregory.  Giveaway ends on August 30th at midnight so get your entrees in today.



Here is a list of what you have to do to enter the giveaway:

• Mandatory: Rate my review of the book and leave a comment tell me you rated my review.  If you would like to see my full review click here.  You can give my review of the book between 1 to 5 stars.  Please leave your e-mail or blog so I can contact you if you win.
• Leave a comment about what question you would ask Jesus if you had dinner with him and get an additional entree.   
• Follow me on Google and get two additional entries (make sure that you  leave two separate  comments that you are following me on Google to get the two entrees in the giveaway).

 click here to go to my full review to the book of Dinner with a Perfect Stranger.



Disclaimer: The book Dinner with a Perfect Stranger by David Gregory was given to me for Free by WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Company throught their blogging for books program. The Giveaway will end on August 30th at midnight.  I will use a random.org to select the winner. I will announce the winner on this blog as well as e-mail the winner.  The winner with have 5 days to contact me or I will draw another winner.  I will mail the copy of the book using the media mail option at the US postal service.  I am not held responsible for mail loss by the US postal service.  You must be a US resident with a US address to enter this contest.  

The winner of the Giveaway is:

Congratulations to The Kalk Family you are the winners! 

  Here is what you have won:

2 coupon for 1.oo off ball real fruit pectin
2 coupon for 2.oo off any case of ball or kerr jars
2 coupon for 3.oo off ball canning discovery kit
1 Beginner guide to Canning Recipe Booklet
2 (0.4 oz) sample of classic pectin
1 invitation to join the National Can-it-forward day. 

  

You (the winner) will have until August 10th to contact me with your address, or I will draw another winner. 

DISCLAMER:  I was given these products for free when I was chosen to host a house party with Jaden Homes.  I did not receive any monetary compencation for these products.