Rainy Day Crafting - Personalized Beer Cozies

I'm up in the Northwoods visiting Aunt Ruth and my in-laws and have been rained in for the past two days. Thankfully, I brought my laptop, my Silhouette, and two bags of craft supplies "just in case." I caught up on some projects that I've been tripping over (literally - the bags were sitting near the craft room/laundry room/bedroom door) for two months now.

I was excited to try the heat transfer material on beer cozies. I bought neoprene cozies on ebay and ironed on the design. I traced a google maps screen shot of the lake in Illustrator and imported the image into Silhouette for cutting.

 

Etched Northwoods Wine Glasses

Wine glasses with cute charms aren't the most realistic vessel for drinking on boats and hanging with a two year-old with a mean throwing arm. I made Northwoods-inspired wine glasses for Aunt Ruth's lake house using the process outlined in this tutorial. I swear, I love my Silhouette every more every day. These turned out super cute and were a total hit with our family.

I was making these in the middle of the night and working in the dark, as our bedroom door is broken and the kitchen light would have shined right into the bedroom while Andy slept. I didn't realize that I had etching cream on my hand and etched my thumb print onto one of the glasses. Thankfully it wash just my glass.

{Holidays + Paper} Last Minute Easter Treats

I had to make an unplanned grocery store run on Easter morning, so I impulsively picked up my family members' favorite snacks for impromptu Easter treats. And by impromptu, I mean, I rushed home, downloaded some bunny shapes from the Silhouette Store, had the machine cut them while I was in the shower, tossed some names on them, and assembled them in the car ride out to the suburbs. Still pretty cute though, no? If there was life before the Silhouette SD, I don't remember it.

Since I was on a roll, I decided to add some rabbit labels to our niece and nephew's baskets as well.

Incidentally, Andy was "upset" that he didn't get a special bunny treat...even though he got his own, ugly - but delicious - pound cake with special white frosting.

Our First Thanksgiving

Andy and I hosted our first Thanksgiving this year. We celebrated Thanksgiving Day at his aunt's house and hosted my family on Friday. It was such a great time. I hope that we get to host again someday.

 

I was so proud of us for pulling off our first big meal. Neither of us had ever made a turkey before, but it came out without a hitch thanks to a melding recipes from the Betty Crocker and America's Test Kitchen cookbooks.

I am a total stuffing-with-sausage convert. I can't believe I had never eaten it that way before. We had all of the fixin's and my family's traditional holiday dishes: Polish sausage with sauerkraut, homemade finger dumplings, and lazy man's pierogi (our's is minus the sausage).

 

I always get so distracted when guests arrive and forget to put out food. I finally wised up and hung a menu and "To Do" list to manage my giant task list and all of the different cooking times and temperatures. This was BRILLIANT and I can't believe that I've never done this before. I saw Andy checking the list and crossing stuff off all afternoon. I'm doing this for every party. It's so much easier than using my phone.

For the table, I used a table runner that I got on clearance at Crate & Barrel a few seasons ago. And because I am nothing, if not predictable, I whipped up some place cards using leaf patterns that I downloaded and cut with the Silhouette SD.