New Year's Resolutions!

Ok, so I know it's already the end of January and one of my resolutions was to not procrastinate! Well, I've already broken one resolution, or maybe we can just call it I haven't had time instead of procrastinating, but then that would break another resolution of making time to blog. WOW I'm on a roll!!! Well here goes, these are my top 10 New Years resolutions that I'm going to make every effort to stick to these from this moment on!

#1- Family- Make every conscious effort to tell my family how much I love them on a daily basis and spend as much time with them as possible. Life is too precious to not!
#2- Preserving Memories- Spend less time worrying about the scrapping and spend more time taking in the memories and capturing them in my mind, camera and soul!
#3- Organization- Keep, Sell, Donate, Thow Away the 4 piles of my life beginning now! (Love Peter Walsh!)
#4- Buy less Stuff- I'll admit, I'm a shopper, yes for those of you that didn't know, but from now on I'm not buying something unless it has a purpose in this household! (I didn't say this included scrapbooking stuff because that always has a purpose!)
#5- Recycle- I really did a good job of this in the summer when it was really easy to get the recycle bin to the curb, but now that it's winter and you can't make it through the snow drifts, it's an easy excuse- no more excuses!! Save the planet for our kids!!
#6- Excercise- OK now the reason this wasn't at the top of my list is because I've actually not had to push myself as hard to keep my fitness goals going, but it's still a priority! I will be working toward the full Dam to Dam run this year though not just the 5K.
#7- Eating Healthy- Another one that should be at the top, but I haven't fallen too far off the wagon, less Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough would be a good thing for my waistline though.
#8- Blog- Keep blogging! I believe last year I strived for a once a week post, but ended up being a once a month post, that's ok, at least I continued to post, I have a 2 and 5 year old that keep me busy what can I say!
#9- Date Night- Due to the 2 and 5 year old hubby and I don't get much time out together, now I have to!
#10- Remember Me- It's really hard for me to take time out for myself, not anymore!

With all that said, I know this is a long list and there's a million excuses on why I can't do this but there are a million more on why I should!

Scrap it Swanky Sister~ Nicki

Hello Kitty Wrap Up

The first friend Birthday Party was a hit and I'm ready to put Hello Kitty behind me, here's the rest of the photos of the party stuff.


The Cake: How darn cute is that? I want a Hello Kitty Cake on my next birthday!



One of the balloons: Forgot to take pics of the others before they deflated~ DARN, they were stinkin cute too!



Crafts: These were the little felt hearts I picked up from Hobby Lobby the girls decorated, these ones were done by my daughter, now we have our own little valentine decorations to boot!



Flowers: My daughter loves flowers, you ask her what she wanted for her birthday and she said flowers and chocolate! Funny, just like her momma, although I'd skip the flowers and go straight for the chocolate! These were from Target also, pink daisy's~ my favorite~ daisy's, they always brighten my day!



Centerpiece: Here's the flower pots I made, I just made some paper hearts and decorated them with some gems and floral corsage pins, stuck them on a piece of black wire, used some floral foam from the dollar store in the bottom of this pot I found at Target on clearance last year. Adorable little centerpieces!

Thank You: Last but not least, the Thanks Yous I made for the all the little ones that were able to make it, we had such a fun time! And with 14 kids all in one spot, it was actually not chaotic, I think we'll do it again next year!




Stay tuned... some of my favorite new finds at the local scrapbook store and my New Year's Resolutions... yes I did make some, now time to stick to them!


Scrap it Swanky Sister~ Nicki

Hello Kitty Party on a Dime

Well, over the last couple of weeks I've been in Hello Kitty Heaven, trying to find items for my daughters birthday party that's tomorrow already! Wow time sure does creep up on me!! So this is her first friend party~ she's turning 5~ can't believe it!! Kindergarten next year (I'm crying inside) but so happy that she's growing into a sweet young little girl now. Back to Hello Kitty, so it's pretty popular I guess with the little girls, but she's also got a few boys that will be at the party so we've opted to go with the Bolt theme for them with favors and whatnot. So I made up the invitations out of pink cardstock and found a cute hello kitty picture on-line to use for the invite. I love making invitations, I think I've made every year of invitations for her birthday except for last year I think I opted for store bought. Mine are cuter anyway (little conceited, I know). I put some black rick-rack around the photo and used a glitter pen to highlight Hello Kitty's sunglasses and put a gem on her bow! So cute I think! Then I just printed out the party information cut it with decorative scissors on the top and bottom and attached it to black cardstock. Too cute and all stuff I had at home to make it! LOVE THAT!!



Decorations!
I had some pink party streamers to hang, I found some Hello Kitty balloons at the Party Store that will be used as a centerpiece. I also found an idea of printing your children's pictures for each year up to the current year to display, I may do that if I have time, but very cute idea.
I also found some cute pots at Target on clearance last year for $1.00 that are white with pink polka dots, I put a floral foam in the bottom of it and took some skewer sticks and adorned them with Hello Kitty pictures and baubles. Adorable!

Party Games!
My daughter is in to Pinatas, ever since the neighbors had to have one a couple of years ago, so I found a Hello Kitty one at the local party store that just has the pull strings so that no one knocks anyone out with a bat in the house since it's negative 20 degrees outside and snow is 12 feet deep around here.

We're also going to do pin the bow on Hello Kitty, I had high hopes of making a Hello Kitty to stick the bows on out of white felt and make cute pink bows to stick on however the snow has stranded me so I'm now going to draw a Hello Kitty with Window Crayons on my sliding door and viola that will be the Hello Kitty backdrop for the game! LOVE WINDOW CRAYONS!!


Favors!
I made up some adorable favor boxes, I purchased the boxes from the dollar store and added a Hello Kitty Picture and added a little "Thank you for Coming to my Party" to the box. Again, very inexpensive and totally adorable (again I know conceited). These are being filled with some pink cotton candy, gems, stickers, lip gloss, lotion for the girls and for the boys, blue cotton candy, markers and coloring page, stickers & bouncy balls.
For the pinata candy, I used white paper sacks (found at Walmart in the paper goods isle) and put a Hello Kitty Sticker and the child's name on the bag so they would know who's is who.

Crafts!
We can't have a party without crafts! So I have some coloring pages for the kids to do as well as some foam bookmarks to decorate or foam picture frames to decorate, whatever they want to do, this is just to keep them occupied while everyone is getting there and perfect for the age group.

Cake!
What's a birthday party without cake? I ordered a Hello Kitty cake from Target, it's one that my daughter picked out~ way too cute!! My daughter likes white cake so I'll be making some chocolate cupcakes with pink frosting for those chocolate lovers and I made some hello kitty flags from tooth picks.

I'll post pics tomorrow on how everything looked at the party~ so you can see the finished products!

I think that's about it! Whew, one birthday party down this year and one more to go!


Scrap it Swanky Sister~ Nicki

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a wonderful time ringing in the New Year! I'm looking forward to a positive and prosperous New Year in 2010! Time to start making that resolutions list, what will your New Years resolutions be? I wish you all a happy and healthy new year!

Scrap it Swanky Sister~
Nicki