After much deliberation, and a load of personal reflection, I've decided to leave the wonders of blog world behind me. I will leave the blog up until the end of August 2012 so everyone can print off their favorite tutorials/recipes.

Jessica

Thursday, December 29, 2011

My World in 2011

A year in review...

I started My World in January of 2011. 
I had 30 something followers and then UCreate featured me as a new blog to watch...and I was off!
{forever a UCreate follower BTW!}
Now I sit just under 1000
{crossing my fingers I hit 1000 before 1/14/12 - my 1 year anniversary}
and I have the most fantabulous readers in the world!

I've done many posts...crafts, how-tos, recipes, etc. and these are the most popular BY FAR!!!


My No Sew Infinity Scarf from early on has had 165,056 views...

Next in line is my Washer Paper Pendants...


My Glitter tutes...





And, of course, my very first tutorial.  How to make a Tutu Halter Dress...


Some popular recipes include my Homemade Kool-Aid Slurpees...


It's So Frenchy...


My World has been viewed a whoppin' 468,271 times in the last year...
should we see if we can double that?!?

Thank you to all of YOU for making My World worth writing :)



Monday, December 26, 2011

Elf On The Shelf ideas for next year...

As many of you know, we adopted an Elf this year.

Rosie is her name and she is a hoot and a holler!  
She found quite the hiding spots this year and caused quite a ruckus with some of her stunts... 
After DIVA gave her the name Rosie, she was placed on our Christmas tree...


and then she made her way around the house...


She wrangled a rooster...

Took a spin in my KitchenAid mixer....


Took a nap in Barbie's mansion...

Got caught with more than her hand in the cookie jar...


Oh goodie...another Gamer!

Writing notes...


Diggin' in the candy box!

Playing with Scrabble tiles {notice the two messages?}


Reading her story!

Taking a Marshmallow Bath in Barbies mansion


Saturday, December 24, 2011

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

And of course my first PINTERIST completion would be LUMPS OF COAL!!!

I'm a Pinterist addict...but I never really MAKE anything I pin!
Until now...


That's right...


I immediately knew that I absolutely HAD to make these for my co-workers!
{back story - I work for/with 25 Engineers - ALL MEN!}
I mean...they all deserve a little coal for Christmas!!!

So...I printed out the wonderfully cute FREE labels they provided...

...visit eighteen 25 HERE to get your own!

To make the coal, you'll need

1/4 cup butter
10.5 ounce bag of mini marshmallows
4 cups of Rice Krispie Cereal
Black Icing Color {I used Wilton}


Since it wasn't clear on the yield of this recipe, I doubled it {except for the food coloring}.
I ended up with 78 good sized pieces of coal.

Step 1: Melt butter on low and add marshmallows






Step 2:  Once this is melted add your black coloring.


Mmmmmmmm.....tar!!!!

Step 3:  Add Rice Krispies until they are all covered with the black marshmallow mixture.

At this point, I called my family in and told them that this was Din-Din!
They didn't seem all that excited about it...humph!

Step 4: Take out small handfuls and mold into 'coal - like' shapes.


And there you have it...yummy in the tummy COAL!

Now...I must warn you of two things!

1 ~ You will get MESSY!!!


and 2 ~ These will turn your smile...well, BLACK!!!


Now just place a few pieces in your bags {or whatever container you chose} and dress it up with ribbon and the super cute tags you printed earlier!


I can't wait to see what PINS I get to in 2012!


Monday, December 19, 2011

More Adventures with Rosie the Elf...

Thought I'd share some last minute 
Elf on the Shelf ideas with you...
these are my three favorites so far!


Reading her own story...


Playing Scrabble
{notice the 'HI' on her lap and then the message on the board}


and finally...taking a Mallow Bath!

What are your elves up to?!?

Thursday, December 15, 2011

The Adventures of Rosie the Elf...continued {again}

As most of you know, we adopted an elf this year.  
Her name is Rosie...
you can see her first few adventures here and a few more here...
Here is what she has been up to lately!


Just what I need...another Gamer in the house!!!


Girl seriously needs to lay off the sweets...


She had a lonely night and made a point to tell us that she missed us.  
DIVA loved this one...

What's your Elf doin'?

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Christmas Candy Bar Trains by Mrs. J!

Hi there everyone!

I'm Mrs. J visiting from Delightful Deets, where we have an amazing Shabby Apple Giveaway going on right now...Feel free to check it out!

And we are back!
When I started our little blog last year, I couldn't wait to share this tradition we have with our family.
11 months later I get to share it!
Christmas candy bar trains!
This year we added a pointed Christmas tree in the middle, usually it is a flat end cone cupcake.
 Thanks to Martha Stewart, I tried the pointed ice cream cone cupcake!
Every person gets their own plate. This year we bought fun size Snickers, Twix, Butterfinger, & 100 Grand for our cars. Peppermints were our wheels, M&M's our track, Santa with some presents, and candy cane kisses.
It's amazing our children went to bed at a decent time...I'm curious how long it took them to fall asleep!
On left, Cowboy's...On the right, Little Miss L's, and in the back, Uncle B's. He made a skating rink for Santa.
Such a fun tradition and our kids loved it! They will be eating it all the way until Christmas!
Have a Merry Christmas!

Saturday, December 10, 2011

Those pesky little neighbor gifts...

You need some neighbor gifts don't you?
Or perhaps a gift for your kids teachers?
Or even your co-workers?
But you've run out of ideas huh?!?
Ya, I know how you feel!
Well...leave it to me to solve all your problems...teehee...make ya some 
Soda Bottle Snowmen!


Oh my dirty snow...
isn't it so stinkin' CUTE!?!

All you need is some tube socks, black tea, fleece, ribbon or twine, pom-poms and orange pipe cleaner!
Oh...and you'll definitely need your hot glue gun...cause this is a NO SEW craft!

And you'll need SODA...doh!

Now, make sure you get TUBE SOCKS!

You don't want a heel or the grey coloring on the tootsie part!

Now...before we get started I should warn you that there are a lot of pictures 
and my bestie and I made a ton of these bad boys!  
Don't let it overwhelm you...these really are super easy...and CHEAP! 
To give you an idea...we made 40 and spent $65 on all the supplies...that's a
whoppin' $1.63 each!

Okay...let's do this already...
Turn those fantabulous tube socks inside out.


Now...you can leave them like this or dye them with black tea!


For a full tutorial on how to dye fabric with black tea...GO HERE!!!

We let the socks sit in the dye for about 15 minutes, rinsed them out with cold water and then threw them in the dryer...and while we waited we put the hats, noses, and scarves together.

Let's start with your fleece!  
For 40 snowmen we used 3 yards...

Start by trimming off the edges.


And then place your soda bottle on the fleece to measure the hat.
As you can see I placed the fabric below the label and also left about 2 to 3 inches of excess off the top.

To measure the girth, simply wrap the fleece around the bottle.


The fleece only needs to overlap the tiniest bit...about 1/4 inch or less.
Cut and use this as your template for the remaining hats {if you are making more than one that is}.

Now it's time to hot glue these mini beanies together!

Fold your piece in half...


Hot glue a strip leaving the top 2 inches open {only hot glue the bottom portion}.


Fold, press and hold until glue is set.
{I totally love that I had multiple hand models for this tutorial...just sayin'}

And say hello to my little hot glue helper...


It's always great to have an eager 10 year old girl around when you need one!

This is what it will look like at this point...


Once you are all done with your hats it's time to start on the scarfs.
I cut each scarf at 1 1/4 inches wide and 28 inches long.

Okay...so it's probably a good time to check on those socks.  Are they dry yet?  Ours were...


Sheesh...that's a lot of dirty socks!  And on the dining room table no less...

Time to cozy those bottles up...get it...it's a soda cozy...bahahahahahahaha...


Fold the top down so it looks like your soda is wearing a turtle neck...see, nice and COZY!

Seriously...I crack myself up!

Phew...must go on with the tute...

Place your hate on the soda and tie your twine or ribbon around the excess.


Now cut strips into the top
{you can do this while it's on the bottle or take the hat off...up to you}


Step back and check out your AWESOMENESS...


I should point out that we used two sizes of soda bottles...2 liters and 1.25 liters

{we are also planning on making them in the 16.9 oz bottles but the socks were too big and we hadn't figured it out at 2:00 AM so we called it quits...for now}

Tie your scarf on...leaving a space for the nose and eyes.


'Fringe' the edges with small cuts.


Now...onto the noses.  
You may want to mute this...
a hubby came in the door in the middle and I'm not sure but I think there may be a cuss word.
{my apologies in advance...didn't notice it until it was too late and this is all I have for the noses}

video

That looks easy enough right?

K...ready to hot glue again?


And then the pom poms...two for the eyes and two for the buttons.


And there you have it...the cutest beverage cozy EVER!!!