Mimosa Bar + Cannoli Cream

I try to learn, every time. I don't have too much going on, so I start volunteering for little things. The conceptual part of me that loves brainstorming, connecting people, ideas and details goes crazy. Then the part of me that gets shiz done steps in to do just that. Before I know it, I realize that I'm happily signed up to co-host a baby shower, champion an event for a green building conference, co-chairing my programming committee, taking Spanish classes, planning an employee picnic, doing my job, and feeling bad about not finishing a baby sweater.

That is when the realistic part of me kicks in to make my lists, and I can decide to cater instead of cooking a damn thing. I'm getting better the older I get, and aim to only do the things that I truly want to do these days. Plus, I've definitely learned to embrace funny mistakes (including a dropped carrot cake) and to take food breaks to decompress (cheeseburgers from Five Guys).

I really enjoyed getting to bond more with Michelle, my co-host for the baby shower. We also enjoyed making the baby shower a day that would be meaningful to our dear and generous friend. The mom-to-be loves Peter Rabbit books, non-pink colors, and gardening. We delivered.

I personally loved the Mimosa Bar idea I've seen around the web, and wanted an excuse to purchase these bottles from Ikea for my juice! People loved serving themselves and mixing the juices. We tied bows of different colored ribbon around the champagne glasses to differentiate a bit to keep track. (Isn't my friend's house beautiful with her gray walls and cute Anthropologie plates?)

I potted mini herb pots for favors. One mint plant needed a bit of coaxing not to die, but I used some sunlight, a fan and some positive thinking to resuscitate him. I'm a big fan of useful gifts and favors instead of cutesy stuff that you feel guilty for purging on your next Goodwill donation trip. They were a hit!

Poor Michelle accidentally dropped the carrot cake and felt terribly about it. My job was to talk her off the ledge and explain why it did not matter one bit. I said, nobody cares what it looks like if it has cream cheese frosting. (Am I right?) She had a great idea for me to create a bunting and I carved some lines into the cake to fix it. I labeled it, "Slightly Squashed Carrot Cake" and we called it a day.

Michelle made pizelle cups filled with the best cannoli cream in our region and berries. What a hit. We ensured quality by visiting the charming 43 years married couple who make award winning cannolis and asking them their secrets while taste testing chocolate and traditional creams. I can attest that Cipolli Cannolis are truly the best I've ever had.

I did buckle down and make a 5 ingredient salad. You can't live on sugar and flour entirely, afterall.

Lastly, we hung decorations, plated everything nicely and kicked back with some mimosas to get us in the party mood and provide a laid back atmosphere for guests. I think that is truly the secret to a fun party. No stress!

Though I did try to cut myself off the night before, I couldn't stop myself from making the cutest pins in the entire history of the world for the Mom-to-be and her family members. I did allow one pink pin to pass for the Paternal Grandma-to-be who just loves pink. But she also knows how to use a chop saw, so that deserves its' own award and a pass!

Game Night

In my experience, people fall into two categories when it comes to board games.  They love them or they hate them. I've always loved board games, with the exception of Battleship which was one of my brother's favorites.  When I would get really bored calling out E9, or B7, I'd move around my ships to let him win more quickly so we could move onto my favorite, LIFE.  Of course, now I'd give anything to play seven years worth of non-cheating Battleship with my brother, but I don't think he ever minded much.

When we played LIFE, we'd let each other go around the part where you get kids so that we (mainly me) could have as many as we wanted.  Sometimes we'd have to add a second car to fit the rest of my sets of twins (pink and blue pegs cut down to size to create toddlers and babies) and drive them around the board.  Surely others did this too?!

It's been awhile since we had a game night in Philly.  Our board game friends moved away and disbanded (Balderdash, Trivial Pursuit and Scrabble were favorites), but we recruited a few new friends to come over last Thursday for the first Game Night of 2012.

We had a great time! We had a to pull up a side table for all of the food, drinks and sweet treats.  And of course, there was plenty of riff-raff and semi-friendly competitive mocking. We played our ancient version of Trivial Pursuit, which focuses on Nixon, JFK, the Cold War and entertainment of the 1930s.  It may be time for an update...

No matter how old I get though, I always love putting those pieces of pie into the plastic pieces, and I always choose hot pink or yellow.

Hopefully we can do a quarterly event, and I can get my hands on some new group friendly games.  Cards Against Humanity is a new favorite, Catch Phrase is always fun, Scattergories is laying unused at my mom's house, and I want to organize a poker night soon!

What about you guys? Game people or not? What are other games I should try?

Fabric Dyeing Party

A few years ago, I saw a photo in Real Simple of tie dyed thermal underwear a woman had made as Christmas presents for her family members. I promptly cut that out where it lived in my inspiration binder mentally tagged under "must-do craft projects that look super fun".  Images from a tie dyeing workshop on Lena Corwin's blog stuck in my head for a few years, and I finally made good on my promise to throw my own fabric dyeing party this past Saturday. (That's totally going on and getting crossed off my soon to be completed Life List).

I invited all the crafty Philly ladies I know over for a day of tie-dying, fabric dyeing, spiked cider, Quiche courtesy of Julia Child's book, soup, baked goods and racous fun. Twelve of the coolest women showed up and we had the best time.

Everyone brought a jar of dye and some type of snack, and I provided the soda ash, salt, rubber bands, gloves, water, dyeing containers, and alcohol. The stars aligned with supplies since we were cleaning out our offices at work. One particular guy at work was thrown off guard when I leaped from my chair exclaiming that I loved him when he asked if anyone wanted a box of rubber gloves and rubber bands. Excess recycling bins proved to be excellent dyeing bins, and I can share the remaining ones with my book club friends.  My genius idea was to put coffee filters on the bins so that we could see what color the dye was. I kept them afterwards, and think they need to be incorporated into a future collage.

Many of us did the "scrunch method" instead of the typical swirled pattern after watching this video tutorial with Shabd Simon-Alexander on Martha Stewart. Whether it was the spiked cider or the sugary baked goods, by the time we watched this video, we were all highly impressed and extremely vocal about our admiration of Shabd's skills.

Alexa made this sea coral-slash-George Washington wig (pre-dyed) that I wanted to try on my head, but refrained.

I was teasing my friend, Natalie by calling her Pointdexter, the mad scientist. She is a new yet very gifted spinner who tried her hand at dyeing roving. She came prepared with nine containers of wool dye, tools, green gloves, and a turkey pan to steam the wool once it was done. Here's Pointdexter washing her dyed roving in my tub. I loved getting to hang out with Natalie way after everyone left and taking a dinner break.

Alice proved to have innate skills. She'd scrunch something up, dunk it in a little bit of this, paint a bit of that, and it looked amazing.  MB made some adorable onesies for her future bambino. Robin made the most impressive 1960's iconic spiral. Lisa made rainbow-colored fabrics that will surely be sewn into something fun. Olivia started an ombre trend which we were all jealous we hadn't thought of first!

I made this shirt, with inspiration from Kelly for the diagonal dyeing technique.

I made a few jersey scarves. The color faded, but they're still fun.

As promised, here's the thermal shirt I dyed for myself. The long johns didn't fit me, so I gave them to my friend Erika to dye and keep.  I started loving the navy color I had, and all of my things started turning blue-violet.

I tried some folding techniques on a rayon linen blend. I don't know what I'll do with them, but I have some nice large pieces of striped dyed pink and blue-violet fabrics now. I would recommend using a more concentrated mix to achieve brighter colors, and definitely letting the dye sit at least 24 hours. The linen turned out well, but I was hasty with the chevron tie dyed fabric that just didn't work out how I had hoped. I'll live!

I can't tell you how much fun we have, and how happy I am to know such wonderful people who like crafty goodness as much as I do. I love seeing the thread of how these people are all connected, and to see it get more intertwined as time goes on. Wow, that makes me sound nerdy, but it's so true (and I am that nerdy at times!)

The best part of having a studio is that you can make a mess, and the marks can serve as a fun memory later on. See the aftermath below!

I think the next craft night will have to be something less messy though. I'm thinking I'll expand our annual Christmas ornament making event!