archived: i heart embroidery (i REALLY heart it)!!

i've been inspired by people (like her) who embroider for a while now so this weekend i decided to give it a try.

i used this book (i also heart the library) to get some pointers and went to it. it was surprisingly easy and now everything i look at i think about what i can stitch on it! i really want to get to a point where i can draw my own designs, but for now i'm using graphite paper to transfer designs to fabric and then stitch over it. BEST craft ever! love them! don't you wonder what this 'mr & mrs' embroidery will turn out to be??

PS..here are a few new sites i'm excited about: robot jumping rope & top secret recipes oh...and i love ALL of the links from this post (my morning has been spent devouring them all...)

archived: i think i have a problem

i made more cupcake related things... i don't know where this little obsession came from. i guess i just can't get over how CUTE everything cupcake is.

these (bakerella again...) looked incredibly easy and straightforward so i decided to give them a try... they were kind of easy, but maybe not as much as i would have hoped... especially cuz i tried to do the chocolate dipping at 6am before work...

grant insisted that if i posted this picture i would caption it "slapping balls together"...i know i shouldn't laugh but seriously...its kind of funny, right??

it seemed like there was endless cake batter... so i multitasked...HI JANELLE

ok...this is where 6am came in...waiting for the chocolate to harden and not fall asleep...

ready to take a dip...

the first finished one... the tupperware kind of shows how small they are... about the size of a truffle.

they look cuter all clustered together...

although they didn't turn out quite as cute as i'd hoped, apparently they tasted good... this email entitled "holy frickin' mackeral" from steph says it all...

"So, I just had this AMAZING chocolate treat with blue frosting…and I wish I had like 20 more!!!! Nicole, you are missing your calling. You have to own your own business and spread this incredible talent of yours.

....discussion of other things....

"Did I mention how amazing those chocolate treats were? I’ll write all the testimonials when you launch the business. You are truly amazing (stealing a line from your husband to be). "


i made about 20 of these mini cupcake treats, but i think i will use the other 40 cake balls to make these cuz they look much easier and more forgiving of mistakes...

archived: more cupcakes and a tea

i continue to slack in posting... its just been rough. i think it will just be this way from here until we move so i guess i'll get used to it?

since this weekend is about to start i thought i'd post my pictures from last weekend...

as i mentioned we had a big week last week so I made more cupcakes, these ones for burton's graduation (and i made extra toppings for the birthday extravaganza coming up this weekend!)

could these be ANY cuter?? remember... when you want to make a cute and DELICIOUS dessert visit bakerella

school colors...maroon and gold (the maroon didn't turn out perfect, but its the thought right?)

get excited!!....

I got a cupcake carrier!! It was up there with the slanket in terms of its necessity! I LOVE it my cupcakes made it all the way to portland in PERFECT condition. Now grant won't have to drive me to work when i make cupcakes...

OH... so the tea part of the title. while i worked on these cupcakes Kendra and I were in the middle of a tea party! We had been in discussions about having one for several weeks and we finally made it happen.



Kendra is amazing and much more worldly than me so she shows me SO many things that I end up loving. Among these is Jane Austen movies. We've gotten together three or four times to watch different versions of her stories and I just LOVE them! The best ones are from PBS...they have even made some new versions this year! If you like a good love story, period pieces, and/or happy endings...these are for you! I HEART THEM.

This weekend we watched this version of Pride and Predjudice (be warned...it is 6 hours long) and this version of Emma...my favorite that we've watched is either this Sense and Sensibility OR this Mansfield park. (PS... a facebook quiz told me I'm most like Fanny Price...makes me so happy cuz I LOVE HER!)

Anyway... that is the update for now. If you need more fabulous PBS stuff to watch... try this, or any of these, or this. =)

archived: martha's yarn cards

have i shared how much i LOVE getting martha's craft of the day emails? (almost) every time i immediately open google notebook (i'm telling you... this is EXACTLY why its soo handy) and clip the idea for later.

these yard cards have been something i've wanted to do and this week proved to be just the week to do it... we have 3 birthdays, 1 graduation, and mother's day! they are so easy and WAY too cute, don't ya think? i was lazy and didn't go to the store to get a fine tipped bottle of craft glue and used my old trusty rubber cement and it worked fine, but next time I think i'll get the small tipped bottle of glue... the cake card was hard without it!

i love them all, but these two were my favorites...

archived: cupcakes

a few weeks ago donna asked me to help her make some UO themed cupcakes for the annual library tea at the university.

she wanted to make the symbolic O that is the university's current trademark. i fretted for a while about how we could do that. and thanks to google reader and bakerella (p.s. she is AMAZING and i want to make everything she posts on her site... she makes it all seem SO easy!) we found the PERFECT technique a few days before we were set to meet.

donna also got some duck molds...aren't they awesome?

i made a few flowers and party hats for kendra's birthday (more on that later)....aren't they too cute?