Cupcakes for a CARS themed birthday

My little one has a birthday coming up in a few weeks and we decided to go with a CARS theme. I've got a few tricks up my sleeve thanks to other creative souls in the Pinterest world, but I wanted to make the cupcakes for the party myself, rather than spending the $30/dozen it would cost to have them made for us. (trust me those cupcakes are worth the $30/dozen--we used that baker for our wedding and they were a HIT! but not an appropriate amount of money for our family to spend on a little tikes birthday party)

To stick with the "Lightning McQueen" color scheme, I decided to make red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting, yellow sprinkles and… decorations. I researched some pre-made CARS cupcake toppers, but they too were expensive, and weren't a very good resemblance of the characters. Since we still have a large number of adults coming to the party, the plastic toppers (rings) aren't a great option for them anyway, and I hate spending all of that money only for it to be thrown away. So, here we go!

I did a run through today to make sure I could make them look good before the party actually comes around. I purchased boxed cake mix and pre made frosting, as well as some yellow sprinkles and come creme filled cookies.

I baked the cupcakes according to the box directions, although, I will say this: Has anyone else noticed that unless you are perfect at dispensing batter into the cupcake wrappers, you NEVER get exactly what the box says you will?? Yield for this box was 24, I got 20. I came close, but this also tells me, come the big day, I'll need more than one box if I'm going to have enough. While everything was baking away, I started on the decorations for the cupcakes. I cut cookies in half to resemble tires.

A few tips about cutting these cookies that I learned (maybe you already knew):

• use a serrated knife
• Don't "push" through the cookies, they will break. Every. Time. Instead, "saw" through the cookies slowly, to keep the cookie intact on both sides. It makes the cupcake look a little more professional this way.

The pile on the left is my done pile, the pile on the right is the snack pile--for eating, not decorating, before I learned to saw through them.

Then I went to work making racing flags using checkered duct tape and toothpicks. I have a cutting mat for other projects that I sterilized and used an exacto knife to cut pieces of duct tape and then strips from there (sorry, forgot to take photos as I did this). I put about a 1/2" of the toothpick on the duct tape, folded it over and then added the  flag edge by folding in half and making one cut to remove a triangle. I already had this duct tape, as I plan to use it for other party decorations.

Once the cupcakes cooled, I frosted using the Wilson 2A tip and a disposable bag that came in the kit I purchased. I love the way the pros frost cupcakes with this tip, so before I went shopping, I watched this video to show me the best way to tackle this type of frosting. Umm, isn't she adorable? I thought this video was cute. I'm fairly certain all of the tips she uses in her video are in the kit I bought, just for future reference. From there, I added yellow sprinkles, a half of a creme-filled cookie and two toothpick flags to each one.

I'm pretty pleased with the way they turned out, but I wish the sprinkles were a little more YELLOW. Against the cream cheese frosting, which isn't truly white, they don't stand out as much as I'd like. I'll likely try to hunt down some other sprinkles for the party, but this was all I had access to in my rural town. Besides that and a proper cupcake stand (or maybe a homemade version!), celebratory dessert is covered! Enjoy, and happy baking!

--Shannon

Prince Charming Costume for Family Night

So, since our little is now big enough to go to "events" geared toward families, we decided to meet up with some friends at a local Chik-Fil-A for their Prince and Princess Night. If you've never been to one, I highly recommend it. It was very well organized and lots of fun for kiddos. Plus, kids who dressed up got a free ice cream with toppings! Only problem… no prince charming costume.

Sorry to say it--yet again--but enter Pinterest! I started looking for ideas on how to make a DIY Prince costume, since it was April when we decided we were going to go and not a halloween in sight. And, as you've probably guessed from my posts, I'm not about to buy one from Amazon for $25 for a family night event. My little hasn't hit the dress up phase yet.

Here is a link to the inspiration for the basics to my costume. Sadly, it looks like a user photo, so I have no idea how to credit the creator, other than telling you that's the photo I started with. So, I bought a sleeveless tee at Walmart for $2.97. Sorry to say, you will see the shirt change colors in the second photo, as I messed up the first shirt, trying to alter it, when it frankly, didn't need to be altered. It's a 5/6, my little is only a 2T at the moment (it's all they had in plain colors). But that's ok, because it needed to be bigger to fit over his white tee.

I was trying to show that I had trimmed the sides to alter it to size,but it ended up being too tight. Start over!!

I added gold ribbon to the side of one of his pairs of pants that I don't care about. I really wouldn't recommend this. When they are this small, you are basically turning them inside out as you sew so that you don't sew the legs together. I guess I could have hand sewed them, but NO THANKS! Best to be done BEFORE the pants are completed, but I wasn't about to sew him a new pair of pants as well!

Completed trim on pants and altered shirt (it had to be brought up at the bottom, as it was too long at a 5/6 for him, even with a shirt underneath).

I used some black felt I had on hand to make a belt. I attached it to the front (it's only on the front) with my machine using the gold thread I have to give it some added pizazz.

I added a piece of yellow felt for the belt buckle and some red felt for his "award." The stars were purchased at Wal Mart, and are iron on appliqué.

I made a play sword from felt as an accessory.

It attached to his shirt with velcro. It wasn't sturdy enough to play with--just for show (which works for me!!!)

We put him in a white t-shirt underneath (that had printing on it--doesn't matter, since you can't see through the top shirt) and his regular tennis shoes. Voila! Prince costume for $2.97, plus materials on hand and sewing notions (or in my case, $2.97x2, since I had to buy a second for my mess up). Not bad for a dress up outfit that helped us have a fun family night. I hope you enjoyed!

--Shannon

Stroller Bag - Old T-shirt Upcycle!

**DISCLOSURE: PICTURE INTENSE**

I'm back with a sewing post! This Sunday, we will be participating in the local MS Walk for Multiple Sclerosis. We have a team formed and we have a young team member who will be "walking" in a stroller. For that reason, I made a stroller bag to hold goodies--like sunscreen (it's supposed to be warm), wallet, keys, etc. that would be difficult to reach in the bottom basket while on the move. The MS Society uses Orange and black in its logo, so I asked my hubs for an old t-shirt to upcycle into this beauty:

So the stroller bag itself is not an original idea. I've seen many different kinds on Etsy and Pinterest, but I am not a fantastic seamstress, and I needed something I could throw together for very little cost (orange isn't exactly my favorite color). Enter husband's field attire for his previous employer! Cost = FREE! I've blacked out the name for privacy reasons, but this is what I started with…

As you can see, I've pinned the bottom up, using a technique I saw in a gift bag tutorial on Pinterest. Obviously, some adjustments had to be made, since this is a t-shirt and not paper. Places that were taped would some how have to be sewed. Maybe to some of you more skilled seamstresses out there, it would be an obvious answer, but it took me a little figuring. This whole project took me longer to pin and cut than it did to actually sew. Anyway, here is a step-by-step diagramming for you that might be interested in replicating. I don't have specific measurements, as I eyeballed it as I went based on what I thought might work. I can tell you that I started with a Men's size Medium t-shirt

Pinned at the bottom "gift bag style," ready for sewing

Cut along the seams in the shoulders to split the shirt evenly at the top.

Roughly cut off the sleeves to get them out of the way

(at this point, I put the shirt in my machine and sewed the bottom)

Cut right above the pocket, or if no pocket, cut across at the bottom of the sleeve.

At this point I realized I couldn't make the pocket work in it's original location. I pulled out my seam ripper and carefully removed it, salvaging it for transplant elsewhere. Then I cut right across the shirt at the bottom of the sleeve seam.

At this point, you could hem the top edge, at some tabs to the side, relocate the pocket and call it good. BUT, I just couldn't leave it completely orange. I happened to have some black chevron fabric lying around, so I decided to add the bow I learned to make from Whitney's blog. (I did not use her exact measurements, just the concept) Her bag is much prettier, and looking back, I probably should've adjusted my bow to look more like hers. ah well.

(I also cut the carry tabs here so I could sew into the top seam for reinforcement)

See that re-located pocket??? :-)

And finally, adding the bow.

That's it! All set for our walk on Sunday! This project literally cost me NOTHING. I hate those posts that proclaim to be FREE and really aren't. Obviously, I used things I had at my house. If you had the t-shirt and sewing notions (two colors of thread--I used orange and black), this project would be free for you as well. However, the bow requires some fabric, which you would either have to purchase or have on hand. So, for those of you without scraps or extras, not FREE, but pretty CHEAP! Hope you enjoy! 

--Shannon

Welcome!

Hello everyone and welcome to my Artful Side. I'm new to the blogging world, the video world--all of it really. I've recently taken up art journaling, after many years of wondering, researching, watching everyone else's videos, etc. I've always been creative and crafty--I have a music degree, I'm a pro photographer, I've scrapbooked and love anything DIY--so art journaling intrigued me.

The thing that I most love of art journaling is that it breaks all of the rules. My rules, really. It is so perfectly imperfect. And I love that. I loved to scrapbook, but I always felt that my pages were just, eh, which led to me completing less and less of them as time went on. Oh, but don't think I didn't give it a go, I did. I used to spend hours (during my single and kidless phase) with other scrapbookers in a back room of my favorite shop, working on page after page, spread out across the table, knee deep in paper and photographs. But I just lost it. It required so much energy, time and MONEY, it was ridiculous. And it just started to feel like work.

Enter, art journaling. I've taken to YouTube lately (not for the animal videos or clever memes), and found a lot of inspiration and creativity. Admittedly, I've used a lot of tips found over on Jennibellie's blog (isn't she amazing???!!!). But I've also been so impressed with other blogs and vlogs I've come across--so many creative people!

So here I am, creating and creating, and trying to learn the craft in my own private space, rather than in a group work area. I think I'm finally at the point where I'm willing to emerge and share some of what I've done with the world. Hopefully the world will be kind to my rookie self. So here it goes…. my first video on YouTube! Just a simple one, to get my feet wet and experiment with the idea of making a video, and of course to figure out the camera and edits. I hope you enjoy it!

-Shannon

Artful Bathroom re-do!

I absolutely HATE our bathroom. Well, let me start from the beginning...

Our house was supposed to be turned into a rental property by the previous owner, before he decided to let it foreclose instead. Lucky us, but unluckily, ex-Johnny homeowner decided to to some "sprucing up" before he left. If I could meet him now, I would tell him not to quit his day job, as DIY home upgrades were definitely not his thing. Plastic baseboards, stuck on with 3M strips. Random holes in walls in weird places, many of which we cannot figure out how they got there or why they were there. Wall anchors EVERYWHERE. And although I'm no cleaning expert, these people were filthy. FILTHY.

Enter us. The house has been completely painted, top to bottom. We've patched all the holes, re-tiled and re-carpeted the entire place and in general made the house livable for humans that prefer to take pride in an investment and do not wish to live in filth. The only thing left undone, were our upstairs bathrooms. I wanted to gut them and start over, but after a year, we still don't have a plan and quite frankly, something needed to be done.

I wish I had more before photos to show (sorry), but you get the idea. Dingy white walls, with obvious patch marks from previous owner's random holes and over zealous wall anchors--bland and boring. Now, I can honestly say, despite it's overall size (it's quite small), I love it! LOVE it! It's not fancy, and very simple, but it's inviting and clean and at least now I actually have a desire to go in for a bubble bath every once and a while because it seems peaceful now. Anyway, sorry to ramble on, I know it's a bathroom, but I adore it.

The only before photo I have. Notice the generic builder grade mirror. 

Enter new bathroom! A very warm and (what I consider) masculine grey to appease the hubs. We did replace the toilet when we moved in--that was first on the list. Shower curtain was purchased on Amazon (quasi-Anthropologie?? but for a lot less!).

I did the art of the wall over the toilet, using paint and a few canvasses bought at Michaels with a 40% off coupon. Mirror is from Kirkland's (on sale, plus 15% off coupon), fixture from Home Depot. Accessories from Michaels (floral arrangement, votive holder & gold photo frame), Hobby Lobby (LED candles, ceramic bird), mirrored tray from I want to say Party Lite??

The clock was again from Kirkland's, towel bar and toilet paper roll (not pictured) from Home Depot and the towels I already had in my collection, purchased from Kohl's a while back.

All in all, I'm pretty proud of it! It came out cute, and although our bath is very tiny, I'm so much happier with this version than what we started with. Yay for simple home improvements!