Vintage Carnival Wedding Shower

Welcome readers to my very best friends Vintage Carnival Wedding Shower!!!  I can hardly believe all the awesome thought and preparation that went into making this shower so awesome for her.  The weather was hot hot hot that day, the food was awesome and the the back yard venue looked amazing.  

First let me take you on a little tour! 

The drink table was an old dresser and on it was 3 drink dispensers.  The colours for the party were red, pink, and turquoise so you guessed it that was what colour each one of the drinks.  For "cups" we used mason jars that had jute wrapped around the top and attached to the jute was a carnival ticket. And to add just a little bit more cuteness were very colourful paper straws. 

The love makes a beautiful ride was also a great printable that spruced another table and can found here. 

For a treat as everyone was arriving we had fresh popcorn!! Beside the popcorn machine was a banner that read He Popped the Question.   People enjoyed eating the popcorn in their old fashion popcorn box.  We even had a few containers on the table that had popcorn seasoning in them. 

Making and serving popcorn!!

Hanging over the deck was this beautiful ribbon back drop, bunting and two colourfully painted chairs. This is where the bride to be and her groom played a few shower games and opened their shower gifts.  

And what would a carnival be without cotton candy!!!  Thats right these bridesmaids went all out and even rented a cotton candy machine for the special occasion!  It was actually really easy to make and people really enjoyed it.  We had blue and pink and sometimes if both colours got in the machine together there was purple.

These beautiful homemade pinwheels lined the walk way that guest took to come into the back yard party!  They were so beautiful.  They each had a pink steam which was made from a spray painted pensile and each pinwheel had pink, red or turquoise in it.   We also used side walk chalk to paint the drive way showing guest where to come. 

 Since there are 9 bridesmaids it wasn't too crazy getting everything set up in the morning.  Some of us where outside setting up and some where instead preparing the delicious food that we would enjoy.

Krissy the maid of honour, party planner and brides sister did a fantastic job putting everything together and was very busy doing last minute jobs before the lunch time shower began.   Here she is decorating her beautiful cupcake ice cream cones.

When we knew the bride to be was on her way the wedding party headed out front, with our cute little drinks, to greet her and her groom! 

So I will confess that the blue drink is Kool-aid!!!  Yes you heard me I was drinking Kool-aid...but I wanted my outfit to be all the same colour :P 

The couple arrived and were taking down pinwheel lane to their own carnival. 

I wish I had more pictures of the food that we served but to give you an idea everything was mini!!  We had mini hotdogs, mini pulled pork sliders, corn on the cob which we broke in half to be "mini" along with lots of salads. 

The desserts consisted of cupcakes, ice cream cone cupcakes, cotton candy, timbits,  marshmallow treats, strawberry short cake,  and delicious homemade funnel cakes with fresh strawberries and whip cream. 

At gift time all the bridesmaids went in on this gift for Deanna.  Its her own pink kitchen aid for her new house!! 

And all great parties must have a photo booth so here we are the girl half of the wedding party. 

Because it was sooooo hot that day and we were out in the back yard all afternoon in the sun some of the gals decided to jump in the pool dresses and all. 

When the party was over the hubby's showed up with the kids and we spent the rest of the late afternoon and evening in the pool, eating lots of treats and having a washer tournament.  Oh and the kids got to do the pinata that we had for the shower as well. 

Chocolate Covered Strawberry Popsicles

Another awesome summer treat that we have enjoyed around here this summer!!!   I found this treat while search the web and even though my picture is not as beautiful as the original let me tell you that they are just as tasty!!!  

The recipe comes from chocolate and carrots and can be found here.   But the recipe was so simple to make its pretty simple strawberries and water.  

I used fresh strawberries that were hand picked at the local u picked. 

Now for the best part the chocolate!  I did make the homemade magic shell (just like the recipe did) with semi sweet chocolate chips and coconut oil!!  It is sooo tasty and worked like a charm.  I am pretty sure these guys dipped their popsicles more than once. 

Raspberry Cheesecake Popsicle

This is a recipe I must share with you readers.  I found it through pinterest, I am sure, but it is just so simple to make such a delicious treat that you must try them out this summer!!  

The original recipe is pinned on my summer time fun board.    The recipe was so easy to follow that these two cutie pies actually did all the work!!  Along with my beloved kitchen aid of course.  I followed the original recipe except I didn't have any raspberry extract so I used real vanilla instead.  

We scooped the thick cream cheese mixture into the molds and then pressed the butter graham cracker crumbs into the top, which will be the bottom when frozen,  and placed in the freezer for the day. 

They sure were a delicious dessert treat on a hot summer night. 

With the little bit of mixture that didn't fit into the molds I make some mini ones for the little ones using dixi cups and popsicle sticks. 

summer fun

Hello Readers!!!  Aren't you just loving summer??  We had a rainy week the last week of June but now the weather here is hot hot hot.  We have been taking full advantage of the sun and knocking off some of our fun things from our summer fun list!!

I am working on some awesome post you won't want to miss.  I have a couple on the delicious popsicles we have been enjoying.  A few personal ones about some family trips we have taken and also a post on an awesome vintage carnival wedding shower we had for my best friend who is getting married at the end of the summer!!!!  

Hope you are enjoying summer as well. 

Summer Fun 2013

Its the most WONDERFUL time of the year!!!  Ok Ok I know we sing that at Christmas and many parents sing that when the kids are going back to school but for me I sing it now because I just LOVE summer.  What isn't to like about waking up to beautiful sunshine, drinking coffee in the sunshine on the deck and of course not having to worry about socks.

For a few years we have doing a summer bucket list which always turns out to be so much fun.  But this year was so different.  Now that Eben is getting older he sat down with me and we went through my summer fun pinterest board; looking at all the fun things other people have done and together we came up with 50 things to do this summer with our family.

I really love the summer fun chart I found over at The crafting chicks.  I downloaded it and then I used picmonkey to put all the fonts onto it.  It takes a little bit of time but as long as you zoom in it makes it a lot easier.  This weekend is the official first day of summer and I am excited that we will be heading to the farmers market to start things off.

I will try my best to post lots of pictures of our adventures and lots of summer recipes that we are cooking up in the kitchen and at the BBQ!!!  

Make sure you let me know what kind of things you have planned for the summer.

Mini Fruit Pizza

Mothers day was so fun this year.  We started celebrating on Saturday night with a delicious BBQ steak supper made by my amazing hubby.  Then on Sunday after church our family was gathering at my in laws for a lovely BBQ meal.  Last year for dessert we tried these delicious fruit waffle cones so this year I wanted to stick to the fruit themed desserts.  

I had seen this idea on Pinterest and thought it would be fun to make mini fruit pizzas.  So I made a batch of these delicious sugar cookies.  I made 3 different sizes of these cookies.  And for the "pizza sauce" I made a batch of cream cheese frosting; which is cream cheese, powdered sugar and a splash of vanilla. 

Then we chopped up lots of different fruits.  We had strawberries, raspberries, mango, pineapple, banana and blueberries. 

 We set out all the ingredients and let people build their own pizzas.

Lots of different combinations to make.

 The kids even loved making little designs with the fruit in their pizzas.

Project time

I have taken a little break from blog due to our lap top not working properly.  But my amazing husband has fixed it and its now a lap top again!  We can move it around and I can finally blog on it during nap time.
Another reason I haven't blog is because we have been busy working on a Heritage fair project.  This project was a lot of fun for Eben and I to do together.

 I decided I was going to let him do all the work and just help where I could.  Our topic was to study the Canadian beaver.  While the other two little ones napped Eben and I would watch videos on beavers, read books and create our poster board presentation.

My scrapbooking supplies sure came in handy for this project.  We used my Cricut machine to cut out the letters to spell Beaver across the top.   Eben would than write different facts about Beavers, choose the colored piece of card stock and glue his work onto the colored paper and then we would place it on the board. 

We made two beaver puppets out of brown paper lunch bags. 

We used orange card stock for the teeth...cause beaver teeth are orange believe it or not and brown card stock for the ears and tails (which you can't see in the bottom picture).  The eyes are goggly eyes glued on.  I used the puppets to get Eben to tell me beaver facts.  He pretended it was the beaver talking. 

Since beavers are herbnivors we decided to make a beaver salad to have on our presentation table.  So Eben and Lady J went outside and collected sticks, twigs and bark.  Then they came inside to break them all up and put them into this salad bowl.

I used some fancy scrapbook stuff I had around the craft desk and Eben wrote Beaver Salad on it. 

The night before the Heritage Fair I decided to make beaver tails for supper.  I was so happy to find this recipe for them.  They were easy to make and they tasted so delicious. 

I rolled out a few at a time, gave them a quick fry and then brushed with melted butter and rolled in cinnamon sugar mixture. 

The last part of the project was constructing the beaver lodge. This fun activity was done with the school principle. 

 We started with a small cookie sheet and cut a 12*12 piece of blue card stock to fit in it.  Next I mixed up some frosting with brown food coloring.  Then I let the little ones go to town with pretzel sticks.  They did use a toliet paper roll to use as the inside of the lodge.

 I think I caught someone licking his fingers!

Here is the 3 cute busy beavers covered in mud with their finished product. 

And the little treasure is the beaver himself.

And here is my little man in front of his project before the judges came!  He did a great job.  Everyone who participated got a medal with their name on it and everyone won a special prize.  Eben received the best researched project and got a little gift card to to fun shop here in the city!  I thought this project would be done with but we are going to the regionals next week with some other great friends so it will be another day of telling the judges all about Beavers!!