Apron Give-Away!

In addition to all of the cute things we listed in the shop last week, we've added some flirty, ruffled aprons. And we're giving one away this week on Lulu the Baker (my food blog).  In September, I posted a recipe for one of my family's favorite dinners, Cheesy Chowder, and it has been cookin' up a storm on Pinterest ever since!  To celebrate it's success, we're giving away one of our brand new aprons!  You can find the give-away HERE, and the recipe HERE (I promise, you'll love it!).

New in the Shop

Max & Ellie are ready for the holidays with a shop full of cute new items and more of your good ol' favorites!

bobbi pin trios:  a set of 3 coordinating silver-toned bobbi pins, all carefully matched, made by hand, and attached to a sweet, scalloped card; 1 large resin blossom, 1 fabric-covered button, and 1 stitched felt flower

$12

appliqued baby one-pieces and toddler tees:  sweet designs hand-drawn and hand-cut on the cutest designer fabrics, stitched onto cotton baby and toddler gear

one-pieces: $15 each or 2 for $25

tees:  $17.50 each or 2 for $30

little chef aprons:  oh, how we love these little beauties!  Perfectly sized for 3- to 6-year-olds, completely reversible, with elastic necks and velcro waist bands so they can put them on by themselves; perfect for playtime or helping in the kitchen.  And did we mention they're adorable?

$20

tiny charm earrings:  hand-stamped on sterling silver or 14K gold-fill, these little 1/2" beauties are made to order and oh so sweet; choose from 4 cute designs or your initials!

$18

tiny charms:  just like our tiny charm earrings, but attached to a super-sturdy jump ring and ready to string on a chain or charm bracelet

$8

boo boo kits:  fully stocked with band-aids and alcohol wipes, but also the perfect size for credit cards, gift cards, business cards, etc

$5

blossom earrings:  sweet, resin blossoms in a variety of bright and happy colors, all with sterling silver posts and backs

$13

celebration bunting totes:  grocery shopping and taking books to the library have never looked so good!  A canvas tote with two lines of hand-painted triangle bunting, plus one appliqued felt flag and one appliqued fabric flag

$20

Happy Thanksgiving--Do You Want Pies With That?

click HERE to see some of our family favorites:
caramel apple cheesecake pie
sawdust pie
apple slab pie
lemon blueberry buttermilk pie
sour cherry pie with pistachio crumble
pumpkin chiffon pie
&
coconut custard pie

A Body Birthday Party

Sometimes it's really funny (and bittersweet) to look back to this exact time one year ago.  I see my kids all day every day, so I don't notice how much they're changing. But when I look at pictures of them from last Halloween or from last year's birthday party, it strikes me how much they've grown up.  Case in point:  it feels like our six-year-old has been a major, hard-core tomboy forever, so it amuses me to think that for her birthday last year she wanted a Sleeping Beauty party!  This year, in fine tomboy form, she wanted a body birthday party (she wants to be a "tummy doctor" when she grows up).  Since her birthday is less than a week after Halloween, we were careful not to make her party Halloween-y at all:  no bloody body parts, no gory limbs, etc.

When the party-goers first arrived, we traced their outline on a big piece of butcher paper and gave them crayons to do a life-sized self portrait.

We hung all of the self-portraits in the hallway and took pictures of each kid with their artwork!

We had some unexpected down-time between activities and lunch (because I completely forgot about one of the activities we had ready to go), so I put some Yoga for Kids on the TV.  And they LOVED it! Seriously, those children were positively spellbound!

We tried to keep lunch easy and relatively healthy, so we had pizza delivered, and carrot and celery sticks, red and green grapes, and juice on the side.

After a failed attempt at a homemade pinata (it cracked), we bought a white baseball pinata from the party store, picked off the red detailing, and taped on some construction paper to make it into an eyeball.  That seemed way less weird than buying a person pinata and having the kids bash it, which just seems creepy and inappropriate!

The birthday cake was actually really easy.  A homemade chocolate cake with homemade chocolate frosting, and then a skeleton torso made from white store-bought fondant.  It was just like play-dough. (idea from Country Living magazine)

Our party favors were inspired by the Scooby Snacks we had at a friend's Pink Puppy Party over the summer.  They're shaped like bones and taste like cinnamon grahams.  We just dipped them in white almond bark and made them into "Bone Cookies."  I ate a ton of these!  Luckily, I saved enough to give away as party favors.

The other party favor each child got to take home was this cute, very scientific book full of facts about skeletons.  I spotted it in one of the Halloween book orders that came home from kindergarten.

Raise your hand if you like funny guys and mexican food

I may be biased, but I think my brother is pretty entertaining.  He and his friends have this project going on right now called 88 Night of Cinco de Mayo.  They live near a mexican restaurant with 88 items on the menu, and they decided to try everything on the menu in order, film their meals, and edit them into short movies.  Some episodes are funny, some are thought-provoking.  They're currently on episode 21, but since the episodes are only 1-2 minutes each, you can catch up pretty quickly.  Take a look at my favorite episode so far, "If You Had to Guess...":

And if you live in the LA area--or are willing to travel there (at your own expense, naturally)--they are having a funny little contest called the "Making Dreams Come True" contest.  Details HERE.

Find 88 Nights of Cinco de Mayo

on the interwebs

in the youTubes

on facebook

on twitter

Event Sponsors Wanted

Hi Readers.  I help organize Bliss Handmade, a semi-annual shopping event featuring handmade items from local crafters and artists.  We have our 2011 Holiday Boutique coming up on November 12th and are looking for sponsors.  We need items donated for our door prize drawings during the event as well as small items donated for goodie bags that we are giving away to the first dozen shoppers.  If you are a crafter or artist and would like to donate items, you can click HERE for all of the details.  In exchange for your generous donations, we offer lots of free advertising and exposure (online, in print, and in person), which is great for anybody trying to get the name of their shop or business out there.  Check out the Bliss Handmade website for all of the important info.  Thanks!!

New Projects

We have been busy busy busy this summer with projects.  I'd like to share them all with you.  Here's the biggest project we worked on this summer:

Welcome James!