Candy Corn Prints

I love any crafts with hand/footprints so I was excited to turn Olive's foot into a candy corn stamp!!  I had never painted her foot before so I wasn't sure how she'd react.  Lucky for me, she loved it!!  Well, she was smiling, didn't cry and was pretty entertained by the paint brush so I can only assume that means she loved it.

You'll need: wet paper towels, 3 small sponge brushes, white, orange and yellow paint, blank note cards.  I bought the brushes & paint at Dollar Tree so I had to make my own orange.

I stripped Olive down to her diaper and put her in her Bumbo seat.  I also pulled back the table cloth so I could easily wipe off our working surface.

Are those paints for ME?!?!?!

 We talked through the steps and Olive was anxious to check out the supplies.  She just started being able to hold on to things for longer periods of time so the paint brush occupied her for a while.

 Painted tootsie.  Luckily she was pleased as punch sucking on her fingers and didn't try to chew on her painted toes!

 I stamped her foot 12 times and repainted the colors each time.  I pressed the card onto her foot and tried not to let her wiggle very much.  She didn't seem to mind.  I should also say that I fed her right before we started this DIY project so she'd be full and happy.  It took less than 20 minutes from start to finish.  I did lay out all of my supplies in advance and added Olive into the mix when everything was ready.

 I let them dry for a couple of hours.

 Once they were 100% dry, I drew a Sharpie border on each side, 

added Olive's name stamp to the corner and wrote a message inside.

 I sealed the envelopes with green washi tape and sent them on their way.  I did save one print for myself and framed it so we'd always have this sweet memory of Olive's first Halloween.

Celebrating holidays with kids is SO much fun!!  You could easily make these your THANKSGIVING cards, place cards or make a cute garland out of them.

Baby's 1st Halloween!!

We're so excited to celebrate Olive's 1st Halloween!!

She's the cutest pumpkin around :)

 The boys wanted to get in on the festivities too.

Happy Halloween BABY!

WIWW

I love Fall and wearing layers.  I have been pulling out my scarves and having fun accessorizing with jackets.  Now I just need to get better at remembering to take pictures of my outfits each day.  We made it to the pumpkin patch this week and it was chilly!  I should have worn a coat but luckily remembered to grab a scarf.  I need to remember that the weather has finally turned colder.

1. Going to Church
dress & belt - Target
cardigan - Dillards
earrings - Francesca's
Olive's outfit - Target/H&M

2. Pumpkin Patch

top - GAP

skinnies - JCPenneys

flats - Lucky

scarf - Macys

earrings - Francesca's
*Olive's outfit - Marshalls

Linking up with TheBestofStyle, ThePleatedPoppy, StyleElixir, CasualFridays
& FavoriteFashionFriday
Because Shanna Said So

PUMPKIN Cinnamon Rolls

Want to make an easy, Fall breakfast for your family???

Turn your cinnamon rolls into little PUMPKINS!!

 I made our favorite quick cinnamon rolls,

used orange and green dye to tint my icing

and then iced the warm cinnamon rolls like little pumpkins.

Yummy!

It seems like everything tastes better when it's cute :)

 Linking up with
MadebyYouMondays, CraftoManiac, FlusterBuster
ShareIt, TooCuteTuesday, ShowMeWhatYaGot,
TheWeekendRetreat and InspireMePlease.

BABY Roadtrips

Olive has traveled somewhere north of 6,000 miles since she was born just 5 months ago.  She's done GREAT and seems to enjoy our family road trips.  Well, she doesn't know any different and I'm sure she thinks long car rides are the norm.  We plan to keep it that way :).  She's sleeping less and less in the car as she gets older but the road noise still does an amazing job of lulling her to sleep.  

When we travel, I do the following things to ensure we are ALL happy travelers.

1. Bring one bag with her favorite toys, board books and extra batteries.  Her glow sea horse is a must if we are traveling at night because she wants to see what's going on and gets mad if she's awake in the dark.  I also have a flashlight app on my phone that I can use too.

2. Bring several snuggly blankets.

3. Pack several pacis.

4. Dress Olive in something comfy/pjs.

5. Bring extra outfits.

6. Load up her diaper bag with the usual items and make sure it's easily accessible to me.

7. I usually ride in the back with her - which is something I didn't think I'd ever do - but it keeps our stops down to a minimum and I can help maintain a nice level of happy for everyone.  I found that if she is out cold then I can move up front but it makes me car sick to keep turning around and trying to get her paci, feed her, etc.  Plus, I basically dislocate my shoulder while trying to keep her happy and then I'm a grouch.  So, really this set up is best for everyone.

8.  Feed her bottles on the go.

9. We stop every few hours to change her diaper, burp her and give her a chance to stretch.  Plus we usually stop for gas, coffee and/or a quick bite to eat.  It seems like we only eat at McDonalds when we travel.  I guess the consistency is nice, they are open late and sometimes fast food just tastes good.

10. I pack snacks for the grown ups and Kevin keeps them up front so that he can easily reach them.  That way we don't have to do a lot of passing things back and forth.

11. We also take baby selfies, talk about all of the sights we are driving through and make some great road trip play lists to pass the time.

 12. We mapquest round trip directions in advance, print out a hard copy along with having the maps on our phones and bring car cell phone chargers for both of our phones.  This step is crucial to keeping the adults on the trip happy.

13. Make sure to give her plenty of down time once we arrive where she can play and stretch out.

We are looking forward to many more road trips so I will have to share what works best for kiddo travels as Olive gets older.

Arkansas Foodie

A perk of living in a new city/state is getting to try out new restaurants.  We miss our favorites from Utah - Barbacoa, Cafe Rio, Braza Grill, Rice and Thaifoon - but have found some new favorites.  My husband signed up for local deals and Groupon so that we could get the best deals and get introduced to new restaurants. 

1. Sekisui - pretty good sushi place

2. Gus's World Famous Fried Chicken - 

We got it to go and enjoyed their spicy take on fried chicken

 3. PF Changs -

while this restaurant is a chain, we'd never eaten here before and we LOVE it!

4. Catfish City & BBQ Grill

pretty good BBQ and what we've now deemed

THE WORLD'S GREATEST BAKED BEANS!!

I'm not even a baked bean fan but these were soooo good.

 5. Cantina Laredo - 

delicious, slightly pricy Mexican 

with great chips & Salsa and fresh guac made at your table

6. NYPD Pizza

Garlic Knots and yummy pizza

We still have a long lists of places we'd like to try but we are quickly finding favorites.