24 Olive Street

berry pickin' - a layout

When the my Noel Mignon kit arrived in the mail last weekend I knew immediately I wanted to use it for the pictures of our most recent strawberry pickin trip. The colors are so bright and fun!

Rather than use pictures from the kids actually picking strawberries, I opted to use a cute one I got of the kids after we were done. I also decided to go big with my picture...a new trend I'm finding I like in my layouts lately. Then I added a couple little pics of our strawberries on the side.

I added the thickers, pinwheel & 'sale' embellishment from my stash. The blue alphas just stand out on this page more than the yellow ones from the kit.

summer wreath

I'm a big yard saler and one of the things I will always pick up at yard sales are wreaths. For a good price of course! It doesn't matter if they have flowers or stuff on them, you can usually pull that stuff off and if there's any bits left on the wreath you can just cover them up with your own embellishments!

I have a mirror by my front door that desperately needed something. So I grabbed one of these grapevine wreaths that I picked up a yard sale recently for a quarter.

I grabbed my hot glue gun & most recent Noel Mignon kit which has some fun summer papers along with some of my own stash & got to work!

I simply made some accordian flowers & embellished with brads, added that fun pinwheel, made a cute little butterfly, added some stickles, then took those cute clothespins & made a little pennant banner.

Originally I tried to just hook those clothespins to the wreath but it just wasn't working out. So in the end I hot glued those to the wreath as well. The only thing that's not glued down is the pennant banner & pinwheel.

And that's it! A cute little wreath to greet visitors at my front door!

And like I said, this wreath is actually hanging in front of a mirror. It just didn't photograph well with all the reflections but here it is in my entryway...

The next project on my list is that lamp shade...and to clean that smudge off the mirror!

the first batch

I whipped up my first batch of strawberry jam yesterday!

I used this recipe for freezer jam. After reading several of my friends comments on facebook about jam recipes I thought I'd try the freezer recipe since it uses bit less sugar and, let's face it, it's pretty easy to make!

This is all trial and error for me since I've never canned anything. But I did discover that the pectin burns easily so you have to constantly stir when cooking it. I also bagged up a few bags of strawberries to put in the freezer for slushies, desserts, etc.

I used the freezer jars because they're fairly inexpensive, reusable (including the lids), and durable (as in, if dropped by clumsy child hands they won't break!). Since they'll be in the freezer I just didn't want to put glass jars in there.

The freezer jam can be kept in the freezer up to a year so my goal this summer is to make enough to last us until pickin' season next year.

I'll save the glass jars for the traditional recipes. I also wanted to use the glass jars for gift giving (and decorate them up cute of course!) this year. Maybe a back to school gift for the kids' teachers in September!

Today it's cold and rainy out so I'm hoping to whip up a batch of traditional strawberry jam. I also really want to make up some mixed berry jam so I'll save some strawberries for that & hopefully we can make another trip up to Green Bluff where I'm hoping one of the farms has some blueberries, raspberries, etc in their store. If not I'll have to wait til it's time for picking those & I'll use the frozen strawberries to make jam.

I have to say that this was so gratifying for me. Picking the fruit ourselves, turning it into jams. I've made a very conscious decision over the last few years to make just about everything from scratch. It's a good feeling. And thankfully I have a daughter who loved helping me so we were able to get the strawberries cleaned and hulled much quicker!

And tonight I'll be making some strawberry oatmeal bars using my very own strawberry jam :)

hey, a layout!

I just realized it's been a little while since I shared a layout. With the end of school year activities and Addie's birthday things have been a little crazy. And quite frankly, I've missed the creative part of me!

So I pulled out one of my recent Noel Mignon kits and scrapped a couple of my favorite pics from Addie & her birthday cake.

Some layering, a few punches and embellishments here and that cute tape measure sticker with the number 1 circled :)

And while I was at I whipped up a card...

On Saturday my latest kit arrived so I'm hoping to get our berry pickin' pics scrapped with it!

strawberry pickin'

It's June and that means it's strawberry pickin' time! At least, in eastern WA that is. I've been anxiously waiting for the strawberries to ripen so we could head up to Green Bluff. Last year we missed out because Addie was only a couple weeks old. But not this year!

We picked a whole bunch of strawberries! Yummy, fresh, sweet strawberries. 21 pounds in all!

How can you not enjoy strawberry pickin' with a view like this...?!

That's the pumpkin patch with newly growing pumpkins :)

Tuesday is supposed to be cold and rainy...a good day for making strawberry jam I think!

summer journals

Yes, this is the scene around here. I have some kind of nasty sinus summer cold that is kicking.my.butt. I'm hoping with a little pharmaceutical help I can get rid of this thing cause being sick during summer vacation is no fun!

We have our summer list up and have 3 things checked off. I also made up these cute & simple summer journals for the kids to record all of their summer activities, what they want to do, what they did, fun stuff...whatever they want to write about summer!

Of course, I tried to keep Ben's not too girly...something I always struggle with when I'm making stuff like this!

For the cover I simply used some chipboard & on the inside I cut some cardstock & held it all together with my bind it all. Super easy!

check that one off the list

We had an awesome weekend and managed to check a few things off our summer list already!

Friday was the last day of school. My kids dressed a bit, um, different??

I never realize just how much they've changed until I look back at the first day of school pics. Man!

Speaking of changing, look at Addie on the first day of school...

Holy cow! Little baby {sigh}

Saturday I took my favorite 10 yr old out to see Mary Poppins

We were waaaay in the back but the show was still great...so much better than I expected. We don't do these shows too often because, hello, they're expensive! But she really wanted to see this one and I know these days are going to be fewer and fewer as she gets older so I took advantage of it. Not to mention we also got to have Italian sodas & a yummy cookie while we were there :)

For Father's Day we headed out to the park after church with our bikes and Subway in hand . The park was b-e-a-utiful. I'll let the pics speak for themselves...

Someone enjoyed the bike ride a little too much ;)

When we got home I made some fajitas on the grill & then some smores (check bbq and smores off the summer list!). Yum!

We're keeping things pretty low key on our first full day of summer vacation today. The weather is rainy & chilly, my allergies are on high alert (thanks to enjoying nature yesterday!) and since we're down to the last roll of toilet paper I'm guessing a trip to Target is on our to do list!

12:01 PM

Summer vacation starts NOW!! Woot woot for no more schedules, homework & getting up early (for the most part). And we finished up our summer list just in time!

This year I took the idea of putting the photos on top from Meg's blog (her last year's summer list here). I loved the idea so I put together some photo collages of summer photos from last year in photoshop.

After I had them all printed & hung up I realized I duplicated a photo on 2 of the collages. Oh well, not gonna redo it!

We've been doing a summer list for a few years now and I love the concept. There's something more concrete about writing down the things you want to do on your summer vacation rather than just talking about them.

This doesn't mean that we'll do every single thing on the list. On the contrary, we usually get through about half, give or take. And it also doesn't mean that these are the only things we'll do this summer.

But it's fun for the kids to come up with ideas of what to do & then check them off as we do them. Plus we don't forget what we want to do all summer!

Cause I'm really forgetful these days!!

There are several things that end up on our list year after year, like:

go to the pool, bbq, summer movies, plant flowers, etc

Then there's others that we discover we want to do & are new to the list. Some items that are new to our list this year:

Cheney rodeo - just found this the other day on the way to my daughter's school field trip. We had a rain out one year at a rodeo in GA so I am definitely going to make sure to get the kids to this one!

state fair - this one actually wasn't on the list when I took the picture but then remembered it & I know the kids want to go back to that this year

Woodland Park Zoo - this one is in Seattle & we're planning a trip there to meet some friends

drive-in movies - I found one that's about an hour and a half away so this is a 'maybe' thing we might do...sure would be fun if we could make it happen. I miss drive-ins!!

Crystal Gold Mine - my daughter was supposed to do a field trip here so this is another 'maybe'

make strawberry jam and Green Bluff kind of go together - we missed out on strawberry picking last year because Addie was a newborn (and I was tired!) so I'm determined to make it out there this year. And I really, really want to make my own strawberry jam!

I'm excited about this summer. Addie is a bit older and will be walking soon. I'm looking forward to a fun summer!!! I also plan on making the kids summer journals to jot down their summer activities so look for that soon :)

This summer list has been Tucker approved ;) Maybe I should add 'make homemade doggy treats' to the list!

last game of the season

Well, baseball season officially ended for us this week. The regular season ended and then we had the playoffs...playoffs that should have ended already but with this rainy weather we've had several games postponed.

I'm glad and sad for it to be over. I love watching the games. I've said this before but I never realized how fun having a boy would be! But I'm kind of exhausted with all that's been going on so it'll be nice to not have a set schedule (for the most part) for the next few months.

My son's team took 1st place for the regular season and 2nd place for the championship games. Not bad!

During the last game we had a quick downpour so while all of the kids were huddled in the dugout, Addie & I were snuggling under the umbrella!

I made up these little goodie bags for a special 'last game of the season treat'.

I wanted to make them up all cute but you do what you can with the time that you have! I was excited to find the baseball cupcakes at the grocery store and I had to run to 3 different Safeway's to get enough of the Big League Chew...definitely going to plan ahead next year!

The last day of school is tomorrow!!!!

birthday girl

On Saturday we celebrated Addie's first birthday. We had originally planned on going to back to back baseball games for my son but they were cancelled. So we ended up having some time to let Addie dive into her cake & open some presents.

And boy did she dive into her cake! Straight in, no hesitation. It was hilarious!!

Then she began flinging cake everywhere so it was time for a bath! hehe

On Sunday we had her rainbow birthday party.

the invitation:

I made the invitation in Photoshop using this digital kit. Super simple & easy.

I kept the decorations really simple (balloons & crepe paper) and Olivia had fun decorating everywhere with the crepe paper :) I had planned on making some tissue paper flowers/pom poms but simply ran out of time. Planning a party & getting your house in order for company during baseball games & end of school year stuff is a bit difficult so you do what you can! Some things just had to give.

the dessert table:

This is the best part, isn't it??! We had gummie bears, chocolate dipped pretzels, rice krispie treats, jello popcorn and instead of a cake I made rainbow cupcakes.

I used the recipes from Hello Cupcake for the cake and frosting & tinted the cake with icing colors...and I have decided that I'm not buying boxes mixes again! They were yummy :)

There was supposed to be confetti on the table...but I couldn't find it to save my life. It'll turn up in a week I'm sure!

the food:

Can you tell it started getting a big cloudy outside?? We had chicken kebobs that I had marinated in beer, Italian dressing & garlic. Yum :)

To the side of the table I had 2 big white metal tubs purchased at Target a few years back that held 2 liters of drinks...in rainbow colors as well :)

And a rainbow fruit tray, for the rainbow party, of course!

All of these white serving trays and cupcake stand I purchased a few years ago for Olivia's first communion party have definitely come in handy! I got the trays at Joann's for 1/2 off and they're very versatile. The cupcake stand holds 37 cupcakes so it's great for parties.

The kids that came to the party had fun with the outside stuff I bought for them. Yay!

And Addie certainly had a fun time diving into some more cake!

Thankfully the weather held out (for the most part) & didn't get too chilly til the end of the party. It was a great day & I'm so grateful for the friends that came over to celebrate Addie's first birthday with us!