McKay Madness

This past weekend, the Williams sister-in-laws all got together to throw our other sister-in-law, Jamie, a baby shower. Actually, it was a co-ed shower, so it was for her and her hubby. Since their having their first boy, we did a basketball theme, and if I do say so myself, I thought it all went quite well.

There were yummy cupcakes, salads, hoagies, fruit, nuggets, and even wings. We had boys there, so we wanted to be prepared with the food. Everything was blue and orange, the blue was in honor of Greg's favorite college team, Duke. We also played a couple of fun games, a diaper toss, and a free throw contest. Luckily, Kevin's parents have a half court basketball court right in their yard, it was the perfect setting.

I think Jamie enjoyed it, and we tried to throw in some fun girlie stuff for her, but I suppose she had better get used to having some of the boy stuff around, right? It was tons of fun to put together, what can I say, I'm a sucker for parties!

Some of the food, and the picture I made for McKay's room. If you can't tell, that's a picture of Jamie's belly, "painted" to look like a basketball.

Here's a close up of the photo, what do ya think? Does the paint look real? I had to work on photoshop for a bit to make it look alright, kinda fun what you can do with a little editing!

Look at these two! Britt and Brett, so excited for their very own tickets to the shower! :) I made tickets that we handed out to everyone, and then we did a drawing. If we drew your number, you got a chance to make a freethrow, and if you did, you won a prize. Now if I had really been on top of it, I would have sent the tickets to them with the invite.

The fun basketball centerpieces for the tables.

Some of the drinks, we removed all the labels and added a customized "McKay" label. We had water and orange and blue gatorade, yum yum!

A close up of the tickets

And some more food, can't beat a great buffet, right?

The McKay pennant.

We had tons of fun doing this, and now we just can't wait to meet the little guy!

Baptism book

About two months ago, my daughter was baptised. We're LDS and our children get baptised when they turn 8 if they choose to. It's such a great time, and there are so many things that we want our children to be able to remember about this moment, but they're still pretty young. There's alot about my baptism that I don't remember, and I wanted to do whatever I could to help Halli remember hers.

My friend had a great idea to create a baptism book, that friends and family could sign, and where the kids could write down their own memories of the day. Such a wonderful idea, I was totally on board!

So, that's what I did, just made a cute little book for her to keep. I love a great personalized keepsake that is filled with love from everyone who is a part of your life! Hopefully she'll really appreciate it.:)

I've also left some spaces to add pictures from the big day so that everything is in one place for her.

I absolutely love reading what she wrote about how she felt that day! Love how kids think!

Shutterfly House Party

So, have you ever heard of houseparty.com? It's a pretty cool website where you can apply to host house parties for certain products or companies. It's pretty cool really, and I hear you get some pretty fun party favors from the companies.

I've obviously never been chosen to host a house party before....until now that is!!:)

I love me some shutterfly photobooks, and when I saw that they were going to be doing a house party, I signed up pretty quick, and YAY for me, I was one of a mere 3000 people who were chosen. I think that was the majority, but I don't really know how many applied.

But I'll pretend that I'm one of a special few, cause it's more fun that way!

Anywhoo, I get to plan a little party for some friends, and we all get a free photobook, pretty fancy right?

I'm slightly excited, and I hope it's as fun as I think it's going to be.

If you've ever been lucky enough to host one of these babies, feel free to let me know what to expect, I have no idea how this thing is all supposed to play out! But yay for getting to learn!

Halloween Bash

I've wanted to do a halloween party for quite awhile. A few years really. Every year I'll buy a few things, thinking that maybe this year, I'll actually get around to it.

But Halloween is at the end of a very long summer, where I have four kids birthday parties I've just done, and I'm usually beat after that.

Well, this year, I pulled out all of my pre-purchased supplies, and there were ALOT of them, and styled this little shindig.

Nothing too fancy, but fun, and festive and perfect for the little munchkins.

for family night one evening, we all sat down and decorated our haunted house...it didn't turn out too well, but the kids had a blast decorating it.

We also had fun coming up with spooky names for the treats, gotta love some creative minds!

Bonus, the kids learned some new vocabulary, like what decomposing means. Always a helpful word, am I right?:)

See these beauties. That's what the party was based around. I REALLY wanted to make these fun drink labels for these gorgeous swing top bottles I found at TJMaxx the other day.

Who doesn't need a halloween banner to bring in the haunting mood?

All-in-all, this was so fun to put together, and it can all be found in my etsy shop. Well, almost all of it. the gem of the party, the bottle labels, can't be bought. Nope, if you want those puppies, there's only one place to get them, and bonus, they're FREE!

Just head on over to Hopscotch Studios facebook page and go to the download link of the side. It can only be found there, so snag it quick before it's gone!

Happy October!

Pumpkins, pumpkins everywhere!

It's that time of year. I bought myself some pumpkin spice hot cocoa at the store the other day. Oh my heavens, amazing!

So in honor of fall, and all things pumpkin, here are a few goodies from Pinterest, the site that has majorly addicted me in every way. What a way to waste some time, looking at pretty things...ahh!:)

pumpkin rolls from the girl who ate everything

This one looks so easy, yet so dang cute!

2x4 wood pumpkins from brown paper packages

Button Pumpkin {with tutorial} from every creative endeavor

Pumpkin Gingerbread Trifle recipe from Taste of Home....must try this soon!

  

Stenciled pumpkin from BHG

An adorable pumpkin topiary from Urban Grace Interiors who also had tons of other pumpkin pictures on her site that were SO fun and cute...must try some of them soon!

Enjoy the season, and I'll be back soon with some super fun updates and the grand opening of my etsy shop in the very near future! YAY!

A "J" themed party

My little guy just turned one! I've done lots and lots of girl parties, but this was my first boy birthday party and I wanted something fun and cute for him.

Since his nickname is JJ, we decided to go with something easy, and cute for a one year old. A "J" themed party, in my favorite boy colors of course.

Did you know that there aren't alot of treats/snacks out there that start with J? It was a little harder than I thought it'd be, and I took a few liberties with my creative naming of the food.:) Hey, a girls gotta do, what a girls gotta do!

Not only was I trying to find J food, but they needed to be in the right colors. Talk about making me think. But, because of some creative naming and help from some smart friends, it all came together pretty well.

I'm sure JJ totally appreciated all of it!

These lollipops were actually used at my baby shower for the little guy. Such fun colors, told ya I love em.

Who doesn't love a big ol chunk of chocolate?

My cake decorating skills are a little lacking, so don't look too closely, and realize that I'm much better with photoshop than I am with frosting.

Halli just couldn't resist getting in there and helping her baby brother out.

Such a sweet little man, and I can't believe how fast time has gone!

My Fall Mantel and a freebie

I am so very ready for fall! Granted, I'm in houston and it's still in the upper 90's and feeling very much like summer still.

But we'll pretend for a little bit that summer is actually over, and the fall season has arrived!:)

I've been getting the house ready and putting up all the fall decor.

I love my mantel. It just makes me happy.

I also love subway art, in case you hadn't noticed.

Oh, you want one too? Well here ya go!

Just click on the picture and it'll take you to the download page, where you can choose between an 8x10 or 11x14. Enjoy!