Author Archives: artsyfartsymamadeb

Flowers and Strawberries Kind of Party

No matter how hard I try to plan and prepare for a party earlier in the year, I still manage to wait till the last minute to complete a project for a party. The problem for me is that there are way too many great party ideas on Pinterest. Ending up with just a few ideas for a party never seems to happen.

I often tend to overthink things and go overboard but I just love decorating for parties. One of my biggest flaws is that I get so into decorating that I often forget the time. Therefore, I’m always running late. Then I forget to take pictures of the decorations before the party begins.

Here are just a few pictures of our daughter’s birthday party from a few months ago. The paper flowers for the backdrop were so fun to make. I watched many Youtube.com videos and saved so many pins on Pinterest on how to make them. Be prepared to have lots of hot glue sticks on hand if you plan to make the flowers.

The party theme was Flowers and Strawberries. The cake table backdrop turned out a lot shorter than I wanted it to be but it went over fairly well. We used our room divider to display it. The material I used was thin, cotton broadcloth from Joann Fabric. It was on sale for $1.99 a yard and I only used about 2 yards.

The strawberry eggs were filled with candy for a garden hunt for the little ones. I found the idea via Pinterest which lead me to the following link. There are so many cute strawberry party ideas. http://siayla.blogspot.ca/2013/10/aaylas-strawberry-shortcake-birthday.html

We absolutely love having pictures taken of the guests at our parties. We created a photo booth with a pink floral background that I purchased from Amazon.com and completed the booth with handmade berry signs and cute but cheesy photo props. We were so happy to get some great shots of the party guests for our daughter’s memory books.

Here is the Youtube.com video from http://ashandcrafts.com/ that I used for one of the flowers on my daughter’s birthday party backdrop.

 

Here’s the link to the instructions to the Dahlia flowers on the backdrop.

Welcoming Spring With A Dahlia Tutorial!!

Can’t wait to plan my daughter’s next birthday. Pinterest… here I come!

 

 

 

Hello Again

It has almost been a year since I last posted on my blog. Our Artsy Fartsy Family had a truly busy year. I had my tonsils removed in October of last year and since then it has been crazy ride filled with holidays, birthdays, high school and middle school band events, and a high school graduation.

Along with the Fall season and holidays, I was hit hard with SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder). I was raised in Hawaii and having lived in the NW for almost 20 years you’d think I would have adjusted by now. Apparently living in the NW was hard on others we know this past year. Normal daily life was much more difficult than it should have been and for myself, a lot of it was due to feeling fatigue.

Looking back now, much of it could have been avoided had I prepared myself with exercise, Vitamin D, play dates for my little one, date nights for myself and my husband, coffee dates for myself and friends, and lots of activities. My goal this Fall and Winter is to be prepared to fend off and deal with SAD. Do you have issues with SAD? If so, what are things you do to fend off SAD?

 

 

Weekly Photo Challenge: Frame

This is our oldest son being goofy at our last visit to the Hobbit House. I used the Orton custom effect on PicMonkey to edit the photos.

Goofy Framed Pictures.

Frame 1Frame 2

DIY Pedestal Globe Candle Holder/Terrarium/Fish Bowl

DIY Pedestal Globe 4

This project was not complicated at all. I had a small silver vase from flowers given to me when I gave birth to our daughter and I purchased the small fish bowl from a local thrift shop for $.35.

I just inverted the flower vase and glued the two pieces together using the E6000 glue that I purchased from Michaels. You can add some glass marbles and a tealight for a cute centerpiece or you can also simply use this as a fish bowl (if the bowl is new and hasn’t been washed with soap).

My son helped to put together the terrarium pictured above. For directions on putting together your own terrarium see:
https://ourartsyfartsyfamily.com/2016/07/18/my-first-succulent-mini-garden/

DIY Pedestal Globe 1DIY Pedestal Globe 2

DIY Pedestal Globe 3

Update: DIY Terra Cotta Fairy House Planter with Mossy Stonecrop Sedum

Terra Cotta Planter with Plant

Directions for project: https://ourartsyfartsyfamily.com/2016/08/13/diy-terracotta-fairy-house/

Plant: Mossy Stonecrop Sedum

DIY Terra Cotta Fairy House

 

DIY Terra Cotta Fairy House Planter

I can’t wait to plant a cute fern or flower in this. This was pretty simple and quick to put together, even with my limited painting skills.

Materials

Terra cotta pieces – purchased from Henery Hardware

Decorative Door – Michaels

Marbles – Dollar store or Michaels (I had some left over from a previous project. Actually purchased mine from a local thrift store).

Glue for terra cotta, door and marbles – E6000 from Michaels

Instructions

1 – Paint each terra cotta piece.

2 – Seal pieces with a clear coat of spray enamel. (This planter is going outside in the mini garden I’m creating and I don’t want the paint to get washed away by the rain).

3 – Glue the two bottom pieces together. Leave the top pot free. It’ll be much easier to place a plant in it.

4 – Next, glue the door and marbles to the front of the bottom piece.

Terra Cotta Planter

 

Fun Baby Picture

Couldn’t help but capture and share this fun picture of our daughter. Quite Artsy “Fartsy“.

Weekly Photo Challenge:Fun!

Who Farted marked

Tuesday Visit with Grandma and the Tall Ships

Hawaiian Chieftain 2

Tuesdays are designated our day for Grandma this summer. Life gets so busy for us so we try to keep Tuesdays afternoon/evening as the days we get together and do something with my mother-in-law. Whether it’s to hang out here at our house, visit her at her retirement home or to go somewhere fun, our children know to reserve that day to visit with Grandma.

Grandma’s request for yesterday was to go and see the visiting wooden tall ships, the Lady Washington and the Hawaiian Chieftain. We just watched the movie “In the Heart of the Sea” with Chris Hemsworth during our last visit with her. Maybe that spurred her interest in seeing some wooden ships up close. We didn’t get to tour the ships because the dockside tours are held earlier during the day but we were able to see the Hawaiian Chieftain set sail for their evening cruise around the bay.

Set Sail watermarked

Both ships are quite beautiful. We didn’t get to view the Hawaiian Chieftain up close but we were able to catch a few pictures of him with his sails up. We were able to get quite a few close up shots of the Lady Washington and a few random pictures around the docks of the Port of Brownsville.

Port of Brownsville sign watermarked

Port of Brownsville boats watermarked

Lady Washington 1 watermarked

It’s so interesting to see how much rope is involved in the functionality of all the sails. In the pictures it just looks like a knotted mess but each rope has a purpose.

Ship Ropes watermarked

Barnacles are found in abundance on the marina’s pilings.

Barnacles watermarked

There are a lot of little fish and jellyfish hanging out in the marina.

Fish watermarked

Do you love the sea? Could you imagine living on one of these tall ships out on the open sea for weeks at a time?

Portraits

Portraits

I love the first picture below of our son. These are some great portraits of him and of an Elk. We were visiting the Olympic Game Farm in Sequim, WA when these were taken.

David black and white watermarked

Elk watermarked

David and Elk watermarked

Our Struggles to Eating Healthier

Vegetables watermarked

My husband and I attended a nutrition class last week to learn how to take better care for ourselves by choosing to eat wisely. After the class I rushed over to the store and bought all these good healthy fruits and vegetables for us to eat. My family loves eating fruits and vegetables. Our big problem is that we love the luxury of eating all the unhealthy stuff too.

Another issue is that my husband and I are both night owls. Before going to bed we always have something to look up on Facebook, an email to write or, for me, I get a wind of energy and decide to clean the kitchen. Well what happens when you’re still awake long after dinner? You get hungry of course. Staying up late is such a hard habit to break and it is a contributing factor to our unhealthy bodies.

One of my favorite go to snack is Moose Tracks ice cream. It just doesn’t end there because you can’t just eat ice cream. You have to have some type of salty chips to go with it too. Then after you eat all that sugar you probably can’t sleep. So you’ll need have a glass of wine to relax.

Yes, lately this has been the story of my life. As a child, I was that kid that everyone was trying to feed. I was very underweight and didn’t care very much for vegetables. Well actually I really just didn’t care to eat much of anything. That changed once I started having kids. Now that I am much older, my tastes buds have grown to love all types of different food. Ummm… maybe just a little too much. Nowadays the weight from eating all these different foods tend to stick around my waistline and energy is often non-existent. Mostly due to lack of sleep and horrible nutrition.

Well this is a struggle for both myself and my husband. We’ve taken the luxury of eating so much junk food that it has become a lifestyle for ourselves and our children. It’ll be very hard to deny ourselves all the sodium filled chips and sugary ice cream and sodas. I imagine it’ll take us a while to make a complete change in the way we eat and get our bodies back to a healthy state but we must do this for ourselves as well as for our children.

For now, it’s baby steps. We’ll have healthier snacks during the day in small increments. Some examples are portioned 1 oz. cheese, sesame crackers, assorted vegetables and assorted fruits. We’re trying our best to stay away from sodas and chips. I don’t think we want to quite give up the ice cream, or the occasional glass of wine or beer yet but we will aim to have them earlier in the evening and not at 11 pm at night.

While on my quest on researching to eat healthier I did find that you can easily google “How many calories in _________?” and Google will give you the information you need. Such a great tool to have if you want to count the calories you are taking in. Also, here are a few websites that I came across for those interested in adapting to healthier eating.

http://skinnyms.com/50-clean-eating-snacks/ 
http://slashedbeauty.com/healthy-snacks-easy-pack/ 
http://www.stylecraze.com/articles/8-foods-that-burn-belly-fat/?ref=pin