Free Digital Kit

Want to get something really cute for free? I knew you did. Well, there's a catch. All you have to do is click one word: vote. You don't even have to sign in or enter your email or give away your first born child. None of that. There's a fellow etsian who's in an awesome contest online to win a vacation and a car. All she needs you to do is click "vote" HERE. Then you can check out her ETSY STORE and pick out a free digital scrapbook kit. Even if she didn't have this great freebie exchange for votes, I'd still vote for her photo. It's really very cute. Go check it out now.

Just one of the many cute kits available for free!

You Capture - Water

Water is the perfect theme for this week here in Germany. Temperatures soared to the 90s after staying in the 70s for the longest time. Luckily we have a cool little water park literally across the street from our house, and I have a cool underwater digital camera. What I lack, however, is the ability to insert the memory card in all the way to achieve cool photos. Oh well. Some photos of the boys playing in the backyard with water will have to suffice.

Too warm from playing outside



Cars driving underwater? Why not?!



Water gun fun, so much better when you have a target



Reach for the sky!

Linking up to Beth's weekly You Capture.

Giveaway Winner!

Thanks to everyone who entered my giveaway. You guys gave me some great feedback on my shop, and I've gotten a couple of great new ideas to try out for new designs. I love new designs!

The winner is....Vicki in AZ. I'll be emailing you shortly to see what you'd like on your magnets! The number was chosen randomly from a random number generator.

Giveaway Hand Stamped Magnets Reminder

Just a reminder that my giveaway for my hand-stamped magnets (your choice of four, with any wording hand-stamped onto them) is still available. You can see the original post HERE. Please don't leave any entries here as they won't be counted. Please comment on the original post in order to qualify.

Friday Photo Bliss

I'm posting one photo taken this week that really makes me happy. I'm inspired by Soule Mama. Her words:


{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

You Capture - Purple

This week's theme at I should be folding Laundry's You Capture is purple. Or atleast I think it is. Beth's been going through a rough patch so understandably her blog has taken a back burner. I'm still really enjoying photography and learning what my camera and I can do. I've also been playing with textures. They've really enhanced some photos that I've taken on my recent forays. Here's my week's purples:

Giveaway: Handstamped Magnets

So awhile back I posted my tutorial on hand-stamped fridge magnets. I hinted at a possible giveaway, so now I'm making good on that hint. Here's your chance to win your choice of four hand-stamped fridge magnets. You'll get to tell me what you want on each of your designs. Sounds great, right?

Here's the ways to win:
{This entry is required. Please leave a valid email address on each entry so that I can contact the winner!}

Become a follower of my blog. Somewhere in the right column there's a button to follow. Leave me a comment letting me know that you're following me now. If you're already a follower, leave a comment letting me know that as well.

Extra entries:
#2. Like my facebook page. Leave a comment letting me know that you've done so.

#3. Check out my etsy store. Come back here and let me know what your favorite design is.

#4. Check out my etsy store. Come back here and let me know what design or theme you'd LIKE to see. It has to be something I don't already have for sale. For example: lizards or Alice in Wonderland.

This giveaway is open to all US and Canada citizens as well as those with APO/AE/FPO addresses. The contest will end on Wednesday, June 29th. Winner will be drawn at random. Good luck!

linked up to: Someday Crafts, Katie's Nesting Spot, Paisley Passions, It's a Hodge Podge Life, My Repurposed Life, Fingerprints on the Fridge, Tatertots and Jello, Lolly Jane Boutique, I Heart Naptime, Petite Hermine, Sumo's Sweet Stuff, Making the World Cuter

My Past Week

Things are crazy hectic around here. In a totally good way, though. Just busy, busy, busy. With what? Trips. Loads of fun trips. We've been saving our money and ideas for this time when our daughter is here with us. We want her to have a great time and take away some great memories. With that in mind, we've packed so many good things into such a short span of time that we're constantly busy or on the go. Here's my top ten photos from this past week (I take a lot of photos!).

10. My husband and his daughter are too much alike. Whenever they get together, it's like having a couple of extra kids around. They like to tease each other and wrestle and generally find ways to annoy each other. It's endearing, in a way.



10. Love his smile in this one; so genuine.

 

9. Emmy wanted to drive Drake's car and Link was running for his life. In this photo, she's laughing so hard she's covering her mouth. Little guy looks terrified!



9. I don't *think* she would actually run him over



8. A beautiful street in Kintzheim, France





7. Drake doing everything big sister does





6. Family pose



5. Beautiful castle we toured in Kintzheim, France



4. Feeding the monkeys at Monkey Mountain



3. Link really excited about the monkeys



2. Beautiful field of what I'm guessing is wheat



1. Emmy being silly in a field of sunflowers

Linking up to

Amanda's Top Ten Tuesday

Summer Cupcakes

For father's day yesterday I baked some cupcakes. I think they turned out pretty cute, and I definitely had way too much decorating them. That part was definitely more fun than the baking and cleanup part.

Cute, aren't they? I made two types of cupcakes. One design features gummy bears floating on green floaties amid a sea of blue and the other design is gummy bears sunbathing on the beach under an umbrella.

They were almost too cute to eat. Almost, but not quite. The boys were unimpressed with my decorating skills and just wanted to lick the icing off the cupcakes. Oh well. Atleast I know they enjoyed the taste.

Since I'm no baking whiz nor do I have extra time to spend baking from scratch, I used a simple box cake kit and vanilla icing. I made the cupcakes following the directions on the box, and then let them cool. Once they were completely cool, I halved the icing into two separate bowls. One bowl I tinted blue (for the water), and the other yellow (for my sandy beach). I iced the cupcakes and then decorated.

You'll need fruit by the foot or the fruit roll-ups for the beach blankets (cut them to size using kitchen shears), gummy bears, and gummy rings. To make the beach umbrellas, I used toothpicks, my 2" circular punch, and scrapbook paper that I had on hand. I punched the circles out, then cut out a pie-shaped piece from each circle (about 1/8 of the total circle), then roll the paper into a cone shape, and secure it with clear tape. I then stuck the toothpick into the middle of my umbrella. Voila. Perfectly sized beach umbrellas for gummy bears.

This photo looks like they're all on different sized waves..love it!

You Capture - Bathrooms

Beth over at I Should Be Folding Laundry has this week's You Capture theme as bathrooms. My bathroom's nothing terribly great, but it's often filled with two rambunctious boys clamoring for a bath. They take their baths together, for now, which really makes my job easier. Bathtime is always fun-time.

Definitely the cutest (and most photographic) things in my bathroom. Linking up to Beth's website

Road Trip

Today we went into France, about an hour into France, for a quick road trip. We ended up at a castle which was A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. We got to walk around at our own pace and enjoy the scenery. I didn't catch how old the castle was since all the signs were in French and Deutsch. Bah! (I know, I know...dates are the same in any language, but the signs were crowded by the tour groups so I just skipped them and promised myself I'd look it up online later)

Any day with a castle is a great day indeed! It was the first time that our daughter got to see a castle or something quite so old. She really enjoyed it.

I might try to post some other photos later, but for tonight, I'm exhausted. We left at 7am, returned at 6pm, and I've since done all the laundry, made dinner, and cleaned up. Who says I can't be super woman? 

She's Here!

My step-daughter (age 13..eek!) is here! I'm so excited, as we all are. We've been very excited and anxious for her to come to Germany to visit us. We've missed her so much and we can't wait to show her around Europe. The boys are really excited too. They love having a big sister that they can irritate chase about.

They really adore her. Drake now tells us that he's her minion. He insisted on taking her for a drive in his car first thing when we got back to the house after picking her up at the airport. Aren't they cute?

Simple Vase

When we got our orders to Germany I was forced to confront all the junk  stuff we had accumulated over the years before the move. To say there was a lot is an understatement. I made four trips to the local Goodwill to donate a lot of stuff, and there were several overfilled trash bins on our curb a couple of weeks too. I didn't want to just move stuff from point A to point B and especially not stuff that I wasn't using or even needed. This apparently included all my vases.

My husband's a great guy and gets me flowers pretty regularly but it's disappointing to have some really gorgeous flowers stuck in a water glass. It's like wearing a glamourous ball gown with flip-flops. To solve my dilemma, I created a really simple and elegant vase.

The best part is it's free to make and incredibly simple. I used a leftover Starbucks iced frappuccino bottle (I'm addicted, don't judge!). Then I added a couple light layers of spray paint (which I already had in the house), added water and flowers, and voila! Instant upgrade from using a standard water glass as a vase. I think it'd be really cute if you spray painted it in horizontal stripes, probably divided it into uneven thirds and did varying shades of say blue. I only have two colors of spray paint on hand though (white and silver). Let me know if you try this at home. I'd love to see your project!

Friday Photo Bliss

Since I don't have time for a proper post (thing are HECTIC around here) I'm posting one photo taken this week that really makes me happy. I'm inspired by Soule Mama.  Her words:

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

You Capture - Flowers

It's Thursday again! Yay! Time for You Capture over at  Beth's blog. I had an easy time taking photos of flowers, it's one of my favorite subjects, but a hard time choosing a few images to share with you.

Linking up at I Should Be Folding Laundry

Cheese Fondue Recipe

Around here, we eat a lot of cheese. We love cheese. We're fortunate that good cheese is easy and cheap to find around here. On special occasions, my husband and I like to eat at The Melting Pot, but since it's so expensive we tend to make our own fondue. Here's my personal cheese fondue recipe:

Cheese Fondue:

What you'll need:
2 cups of Emmenthaler Cheese (shredded) - one of those smaller packages
2 cups of Gouda Cheese (shredded) - one of those smaller packages
1 mozzarella ball, or 1 cup of shredded mozzarella
1 - 2 cloves Garlic (depending on your affinity for garlic)
2 cups Dry White Wine
1 tbsp Lemon Juice
1 tbsp flour
2 tbsp pasta sauce or seasoned tomato sauce
1 tbsp pesto
1 dash of fresh cracked pepper

What you'll do:

It really helps to have a fondue pot (electric one) but if you're doing this on the stove, that'll be okay too. We eat a lot of fondue so we invested in an electric pot. First, cut a clove of garlic in half. Rub the inside of it all the way around the pot, including the bottom. This helps the cleanup and adds flavor.

Pour in your white wine and lemon juice. You can use the cheapest white wine you can find. I buy mine from next door for a euro. Stir in the pesto and pasta sauce. Get the liquid to simmering or just below that. Reduce the heat to low and slowly add one package of cheese. Stir well.

Once it's fairly absorbed in the wine mixture, add the rest of the cheeses slowly. Add the flour, garlic (diced), and cracked pepper.  Let all ingredients mix well, and keep a whisk handy to stir it often. Once you get a smooth texture where everything's blended, you're ready to serve.

I suggest serving your fondue with apples, carrots, broccoli or cauliflower, celery and of course bread. If you use bread for dipping, try to get a french loaf or something with a heavy crust so when you pierce the bread it'll stay on your fondue fork and not get lost in the cheese.

If your fondue is too liquidy, add more cheese (you can add mozzarella, parmesan or almost anything you happen to have around the house). If it's too stiff and immoveable, add a bit more wine.

Hope you enjoy your fondue!

Top Ten Tuesday - Things I'm thankful for this week

10. New blog followers! I'm sooo excited that you're here!

9.  My family. I know, this is standard and every night I thank my lucky stars for them. But I've been very blessed and I try not to lose sight of that.

8. Finding a sandbox on a craigslist type website for Germany. Now the boys are allowed to dig!

7. Having two very brave children. They both had to get blood drawn for yearly tests (standard checks for lead, anemia, etc) and Link didn't even flinch and Drake just said ow a couple times. I'm one impressed and thankful mama. I think anything that hurts your kids tends to hurt the parents more.

6. Tons of sales at the grocery store. There were so many deals that we spent $150 on groceries and essentials around here (like diapers, wipes, etc) but we got soo much out of it. Sometimes we hit the grocery store and feel like we spent a ton of money and got very little. Not this week..yay!

5. Having time to myself to craft. I've done a couple crafty projects this week and I think they keep me sane.

4. Having the husband home on vacation. He's only working a few days this week and then he's off for awhile. Partly because he needs to go pick up my step-daughter and fly her over here...which leads me to number 3...

3. My step-daughter is going to be here in less than a week! I can't wait. I've missed her sooo much. And I know she's going to love Germany and Europe in general. We have a ton of fun things planned, like a vacation to Venice and Rome. Yeah, we're spoiled.

2. New playmates, for both the boys and myself. I'm so excited about some friends that we made and it's been a blast having playdates. I know the boys are always happiest when they're playing with other children and I'm always happy to have company as well. (I know this isn't a photo from our playdate, but I am reluctant to post someone else's child to the internet)

1. Warmer weather where I can let the boys play about in their blow-up kiddie pool. It's like an entirely new toy to them and they spent hours amusing themselves, and letting this mama take a break.

Anything you're particularly thankful for this week? Share them in the comments. I'd love to hear from you! Linking up to Oh Amanda

Day at the Lake

Both of my boys are happiest when they're outside and especially so if there's water involved. This weekend was beautiful with the sun shining and warm weather, so we took the entire family to a nearby recreational lake. It's got a sandy clay beach and the water is really shallow and gently slopes down. Both had a blast since they were able to splash around in the water and dig til their hearts were content.

The water was pretty chilly, but I'm a wimp when it comes to those things. I prefer my water temperature to be scalding. I'm pretty sure the boys wouldn't have minded if there had been ice floes in it so long as they were allowed to splash about.

By far the best part of it was being allowed to dig. I get tired of constant reprimands about digging in my flower beds, and I'm sure they're not fans of it either. At the beach, it was all fair game.

I'm thankful they had showers around to hose off the mud and sand. I was also very thankful for a day spent with my family. I love days like these.