Fabulous at 50!

My sister-in-law, Jaton, turned 50 on Saturday and we celebrated BIG! Literally, the party was held in Kansas' largest barn: The Cooper Barn in Colby, Kansas.

It was an evening filled with great food, tubs of cold beer, buckets of old-school candy, and the warmth of family and friends. (It was also a little warm in general. Just FYI… Kansas' largest barn is not air conditioned.)

What a fabulous night to celebrate a fabulous gal.

Happy 50th Birthday Jaton!

 

 

And then I let Bea take the camera around the barn. Funny, people don't seem to mind when a 7-year-old wants to take their photo.

Rabbit Rocker

Eric built this wooden rabbit rocker for some friends of ours in Illinois who had a sweet little baby girl in February. Anna's only 4 months old right now, but soon enough she'll be able to balance on her bunny and go for a ride. (Or at least grab ahold of the furry cottontails.)

This is just one of many fun baby gifts that Eric's created in his "workshop of wonderfulness" (as I like to call it.) Here are some of my favorites:

Big Ball Rocker

Ride 'em Kitty Cat

Owl Bookcase

Bird Rockers

Wiener Dog Rocker

Yankee Doodle Dessert Cups

Uncle Sam never looked so sweet! 

These clever butterscotch pudding cups — with Oreo cookies hidden inside the hats — are the perfect patriotic and portable treat for your 4th of July celebration. Kids will have fun making them, and everyone will enjoy eating them. Bonus: No baking required. Because who wants to spend hours in the kitchen during the summer? Not me!

For instructions on how to make this easy, holiday food craft, check out my She Knows tutorial.

Happy Fourth of July feasting!

 

Fancy That…. Fruit Roll Up Flowers

Wanna make a dessert that looks fancy-schmancy but uses super-simple ingredients? These sweet little morsels are just chocolate candy bars, topped with flowers made from Fruit Roll-ups & Peanut M&Ms

Yep. That's it. 

For the easy, food-crafting instructions, check out my Fantastical Fruit Roll-up Flower tutorial for SheKnows.

A Little Slice of Summer

If you ask me, water­melon is the most iconic sym­bol of sum­mer. It’s sim­ple, refresh­ing, and sweet. Every­thing that sum­mer should be.

Celebrate the start of sun & fun season with a slice of this Watermelon Fruit Pizza that I created for Handmade Charlotte. The easy recipe and step-by-step photos can be found here.

Enjoy every last bite of summer. I plan to.

Mailable Meat, Grilled to Postal Perfection

Tell dad "WELL DONE" this Father's Day with a (fake) t-bone steak in the mail. All you need are a few simple craft supplies and less than $3.00 in stamps to create a "RARE" but memorable surprise.

For the simple, step-by-step, mailable steak tutorial, head over to SheKnows.com.

Bea is Free!

Look mom, no training wheels!

Bea finally got brave and learned to ride her bike without training wheels this weekend. It probably would have/should have happened sooner, but we like to go for long, family bike rides through the Chisholm Trail Nature Center and Bea typically rides on a tandem behind Eric's bike.

Since we don't have sidewalks in our neighborhood, we went up to the school parking lot to give us plenty of safe, flat space to practice. On the way home from biking, she said to me "Mom, every 7-year-old should know how to tie their own shoes, take a shower by themselves, make their own cheese sandwich, and ride a bike without training wheels.

Check, check, check and check. This 7-year-old is certainly on her way to success.