Fresh Flowers

Don't you love it when you have a beautiful bouquet of flowers, but hate it when they die within 3 days of having them? I have a problem getting my fresh flowers to last. I went to a conference for work last week and I attended a Floral Design class taught by the BYU Campus Crafts and Floral.

First of all, don't be afraid to cut your flowers and rearrange them in a more pleasing way. You can be much more creative than removing the cellophane wrapping and putting it in a vase.

To keep your flowers fresh longer:
~You don't want the green leafy parts of your flowers to be in the water. This creates more bacteria which kills your flowers faster.
~Keep your flowers in warm water; you want it to be warmer than your body temperature.
~Cut ends of flowers every day.
~Change the water every day. If you can, clean the vase with soap and water to get rid of the bacteria.

I practiced some of the skills I learned from that class and from Keri's post about floral arrangements and got to work.

fabric flowers

I have fallen in love with making fabric flowers as hair accessories or as a brooch. I learned to make the traditional silk flower or ribbon ones awhile ago and I love them, but I have been wanting to branch out and find different, more interesting ones. Just searching the internet for fabric flower tutorials will give you TONS of ideas if you fall in love with it as much as me. This week, my cousin came over and we made these three different designs. I didn't list my own instructions on how to make these because I figured visiting the already made tutorials would be easier.

The first idea came from Rhonna Designs, check out her tutorial HERE... I seriously LOVE these flowers! I made two for me, one for a friend, and one for my mother-in-law. I am so excited to wear it. Not only is it gorgeous, but it's cheap and SUPER easy.

The second flower comes from Sew 4 Home, the tutorial for this one is HERE... I love the shabby chic look of these flowers. I have seen several different versions of this flower but this one is my favorite. I think it would look so cute as an embellishment on a bag or just as a cute hair clip. My only complaint about this one was that it was a pain to sew together. I skipped the sewing halfway through and just super glued it to some felt backing. SOO much easier.

Finally, I found the idea for this little clip at The Creative Crate, tutorial is HERE... I personally think her clips are much cuter than mine so check it out. I made this one for my daughter's hair and she loves it. A cute variation of this clip is to get satin fabric and burn the edges, similar to the first flower. Then layer between pieces of lace. I love that idea but I didn't have any satin fabric.

So there you have it, three new flower clips. I got a brooch, a purse embellishment, and a hair clip for my daughter all in one day. It has been so fun making them, I definitely want to try some more.

Candy Bouquet

I've posted on how to make fake flower bouquets and today I'm going to post on how to make a candy bouquet. I don't do much different from the fake flower bouquet except add candy accents.

I purchased a vase, fake flowers, black river rocks, skewers, wire, and candy (jolly ranchers and lindt chocolate balls). I also used pliers and ribbon that I had on hand.

I seperated the individual flowers with pliers so that I could arrange the bouquet how I wanted it. Then I poured the rocks into the vase and arranged the flowers.

After I got the flowers how I wanted them to look I stuffed jolly ranchers around the top of the vase. I didn't fill the vase all the way to the top with rocks so that I would have room to put candy in the vase. Next time I would leave even more room since I was only able to put a few pieces of candy in.
Next I took skewers and wrapped them with wire.

Then I put the lindt chocolate balls inside the wire and I put the skewers in the bouquet. (The skewers were a little long so I had to cut them down about 4 inches)

Finally, I tied a yellow ribbon on the bottom of the vase, both to hide the flowers stems and to add flair!

Winner of our Second Giveaway

According to random.org, the winner of our second giveaway is comment number 11, Heather.
Just leave me your email address and I will send you pictures of the exact flowers I have and you can chose 2 of your favorite.

Steamed Chocolate Pudding

On Sunday, Tyler and I were craving something sweet and chocolaty. I made this in my cooking class last semester and loved it. I decided to try it again on my own.



Ingredients:
1 egg, beaten
2 oz butter, melted (about 1/4 of a cup)
3 Tbsp sugar
½ cup milk
3 Tbsp cocoa powder
½ cup flour
½ tsp baking powder
1/4 cup fresh or frozen (thawed) raspberries, strawberries, mixed berries, etc
extra sugar for berries

Instructions:
1. Place berries (about 1 TB) into the bottom of each of 5 Pyrex custard dishes (Any dish that can withstand heat will work but it can't be too big or the middle won't cook completely--I used a 5" round dish that I have used to make cakes). Sprinkle sugar over top and let sit.

2. Combine first 4 ingredients in a small bowl. In a separate bowl, sift together dry ingredients (You don't have to use a sifter, a whisk will do the same exact thing). Add the sifted mixture to the liquids and mix. (There should not be any large lumps, but don’t over-mix the batter). Divide the batter evenly between the 5 dishes and smooth out the top.

3. Fill a small hotel pan (or large pot) with 4 – 5 cups water and heat until boiling. Position a cooling rack over top of the pan and arrange the custard dishes on the rack so they are directly over the boiling water. Cover with an aluminum foil tent and reduce heat to low (you should still be able to hear a gentle bubbling sound if you put your ear close to the pan). Cook 20 minutes. (With my 5" dishes I had to cook mine for 35 minutes). You know when it is done when you insert a toothpick into the center and it comes out mostly clean. The texture of this dish is kind of like a very very moist cake, never runny though.

4. Cut around edges with a knife and flip on plate to serve. Serve with whipped cream, raspberry syrup or powdered sugar, if desired.
I added extra strawberries on the bottom of my serving dish so I had strawberries on the top and bottom of my dessert.

WARNING: This is a chocolate overload. It is so delicious, but VERY chocolaty so you might want to have a tall glass of milk to help wash it all down.

Heat Press Vinyl

I LoveLOVELove Vinyl. It is so easy to decorate with, easier than painting, comes in so many colors.... But now I have found something so fantastic in the world of vinyl... Heat press Vinyl. It is different than your regular vinyl, but once you cut it (in any shape you would like) you can apply it to fabric with your iron and then it is stuck there, just like screen printing (but without the ink!)

I have been experimenting with making t-shirts and personalized dish towels, but unfortunately we are having a problem with uploading today... so here are some pictures and a tutorial about heat press vinyl...

(Picture taken by Vanessa @ V & Co.)

For a great vinyl tutorial also by Vanessa @ V & Co. go HERE

Ideas for your kids

I have been watching my niece for the past two weeks in the morning and I've been trying to keep her and my little girls busy with projects.

Last week I decided to let them make their own musical instruments! This was a fun activity and we used items that we already had on hand.

For a drum we used an empty oatmeal cardboard cylinder. For a maraca/drum we used an empty milk jug and filled it just a little with rice.
For our guitar we used a cereal box, yarn, and duct tape. Unfortunately I don't have a picture of the guitar because I let my niece take it home with her. But it was by far the coolest of the instuments. For the drum and the maraca I used elmers glue on the lids to keep them on tight.

For the guitar we cut a small circular hole at the bottom of the cereal box and then made 5 small holes at the bottom of the box and the top of the box. Then I strung the yarn through the top hole and then through the corresponding bottom hole. I used duct tape to hold the string in place. As I moved left with the strings I made them tighter to give the string a different sound when it is plucked. For good measure we placed a couple extra pieces of duct tape over the strings to hold them in place.

After we finished all the instruments I pulled out the paint and let them decorate. It was fun and they enjoyed making their instruments and playing them afterwards.

Overall I found this to be a good activity for preschool aged children and a good activity that children can do almost completely by themselves.