cricut explore

Mother’s Day Brunch

May 14, 2019 by Jessica 2 Comments

This past Mother’s Day weekend marked a whole year of us living back here in Virginia and it was a pleasure to spend it with our moms. One of the events we had originally planned on was meeting at the beach for lunch on Sunday, but sadly rain was in the forecast. We made a last minute change and decided to just go ahead and host a Mother’s Day brunch at our home. I was inspired and went out early Sunday morning to grab some fresh flowers and greenery and set up a nice spread to celebrate the moms in our family. Paper plates and plastic champagne flutes never looked so nice (in my humble opinion hahaha).

I decided not to get stressed about all the details and just use simple things and what we had and also not to worry about all the unfinished projects around the house. We got this home to be able to do life in it, messy/unfinished or what ever, so we continue to do life even in the midst of it all. I knew a great centerpiece would really make for the tablescape, so I started by layering greenery on the bottom and then added some beautiful peonies on top. I printed out black and white photos of the moms with their kids and placed them on brown cardstock. Then I spread them out among the greenery. As I said before, I have no fancy glassware or plain plates, so those were just simple paper plates and plastic cups. I did have gold eating utensils, although I found I am missing two spoons from my set! I think they must have gotten misplaced during the move. I got them from Target, where you can just buy one at a time, so they will be easy to replace.

One of the best parts was all the yummy food. I enjoyed putting together a brunch spread. We had egg, cheese, and ham croissants, mimosas, donuts, french toast sticks with syrup, an egg casserole from my sister in law, and then I made these two really delicious desserts. The above one was the indulgent one. It’s the strawberry cream cheese coffeecake from oh My Goodness Chocolate Desserts. We had been strawberry picking previously that week and I wanted to find a dessert to use them in. This was the one I decided upon. I had never made it before so I was a little nervous, but it turned out great! It was all gone by the end of the day.

I also wanted to make a healthier “dessert” choice, so I was excited to try this healthy fruit pizza from Life Made Sweeter. I used almond flour instead of Oat Flour and it turned out great! It’s very filling and all the flavors go oh so well together. This went real quick too and my daughter requested another one yesterday. I baked the base and then let her decorate it however she wanted. It’s great to keep in the fridge for breakfast and snacks and looks real pretty too.

I had a busy week making some presents too and was able to finish two items for my mom. I made her this “perfect grandma” shirt using the free svg from Love SVG because that is what she is. Not in the sense that she “is” literally perfect, because no one is, but that she’s the perfect grandma for my girls. I also made her a bead bar necklace which I plan to get the tutorial up for soon. I was so shocked at how easy it was to make. I don’t have many jewelry making skills, so if I can do it, you can too!

Nutcracker Party Shirt

January 10, 2019 by Jessica 2 Comments

This Christmas was such a fun one! My girls had a blast really being able to enjoy time with so much family. I wanted to do some special things and one thing I did was create this nutcracker party shirt for all the littles on my husband’s side. We are starting to do a Christmas movie theme each year and went with The Nutcracker since the new movie had just come out. Time didn’t allow us to actually go see the movie, but it’s on our list. I created this design using the design feature for my Cricut Explore. It was really easy to create and now they have a one of a kind shirt just for them.

It had been a while since I had created a shirt using iron on vinyl. I didn’t realize some of the new products that are now more easily available. I gave the Siser Easywood HTV in green a try (I found it at Michael’s). It was my best experience with heat transfer vinyl yet! It went on so easy and smooth. I was impressed. I guess I’m a little behind on the new and amazing things as usual hahaha. If you want to make your own and have a Cricut cutting machine, you can find the graphic I made here. You will need to log into your account to see it. Just resize according to your needs.

My two girls are already talking about what next year’s theme might be… I’m thinking maybe a Rudolph one…. Although I might have to persuade miss J into doing this again as she’s hitting an age where she’s not necessarily into wearing matching shirts with her cousins 🙂 lol

Be Silly Be Honest Be Kind Shirts

June 27, 2016 by Jessica Leave a Comment

Be Silly Be Honest Be Kind. That’s a pretty good quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson, huh? It’s something I work hard to teach to my children and knew it would be perfect to make a diy shirt featuring that quote.

I found these cute shirts at Old Navy and used my Cricut Explore to cut out the words and ironed them on (here is style one and here is style two I created for these shirts if you want to use them). I wanted them to be a little different, so I did two different types of font. It’s so easy to whip up something like this. We set up a special day to wear them and checked off another summer bucket list activity: Silly String Fight! They were so excited for this! We haven’t done silly string since my oldest was little and she totally freaked out when the string sprayed out haha. But they both are older and knew what to expect so we were good to go this time.

They stood back to back and we had them take a few steps forward at the same time.

Then we counted to three and said “Go!” They turned around and started spraying. We had one rule: no spraying in the face. They had a blast and had wished we had bought more cans for them to spray.

I hope to have some more fun activities with them this week and I hope you all have some extra fun as well. -jess

A Breakfast Dinner: You had Me at Pancakes

June 24, 2016 by Jessica Leave a Comment

There is a lot more time to do extra fun things with my daughters since school is out for the summer. Last night we had a breakfast dinner and we went all out! We do not have an outdoor table at the moment so I brought out our coffee table and put pillows down for seating. I went with pancakes as the main dish and used this recipe to create cinnamon roll pancakes. They were a hit!!! So delicious. I even created this cute little banner to go on the pancakes. I made it in the Cricut Design Space and it reads “You had Me at Pancakes.” Isn’t it cute? It’s a #CricutSummer project. You can print and cut your own here if you like. I’m going to make a list of more ideas that we could do later today. What are your favorite summertime activities to do with your kiddos? -jess

Custom T-Shirts

May 4, 2016 by Jessica 3 Comments

Life has been full of track practices and lots of other events lately (any other track moms out there?), but I’ve snuck in some little projects here and there. Recently I had a friend ask if I could make one of the grandma’s house shirts and two more custom t-shirts using iron on vinyl for her daughters birthday. It was something I had a little time for so I took it on and love how cute these shirts turned out. I used my Cricut Explore and you can find the design on the blue shirt here. I ussed a white flocked vinyl and really like the look and feel of this stuff. It was my first time using it and I wish I had sooner. Once they release the new graphics (one of which I used on the phone shirt) I can share where to get that one. My friend also sent me a design of the fearfully and wonderfully made shirt and I found some fun fonts in Design Space to make hers a little different. Then she wanted a monogrammed one but I only had a small amount of glitter vinyl left so I created a little fabric pocket to put it on. For the initials, if you search “monogram” these pretty letters come up and then you can layer them how you like. I really want to make my girls each one of the new ones too and I’m hoping to make myself a shirt for Mother’s Day this week. I will share that if it works it 🙂 I store my Explore under my bed so it’s easy to pull out when I want to use it.

-jess