Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Garden Update
















The garden is doing well. The tomatoes and pumpkin plants are doing best. The watermelon and cantaloupe are also doing well. The bell pepper plants and strawberry plants have started growing (finally!). The only issue we have run into is a crop of Cabbage Loopers. They have been crazy hard to get rid of. I've tried all sorts of organic sprays but the only thing that has really worked is finding them and getting rid of them via trash can. They don't eat the fruit or crop but they eat all the leaves and its pretty darn unsightly. We started using fish emulsion and it has really helped the growth of the plants. I would completely recommend it. We purchased ours at our local Lowes.

First ripe tomato!



















The topsy turvey has been doing really REALLY well. We even have our first fully ripe tomato. This tomato plant is a heirloom organic beefsteak. I have found the topsy turvey has to be watered every day and alot. So it requires extra tomato food because it most of the food drains out the bottom. But it is doing well and I have a full crop of little green tomatos sprouting up. You can't see them very well in the photo below but they are definately there.








Monday, August 8, 2011

Mustache Bash 70th Birthday

We threw a Mustashe bash for my dad's 70th birthday . I created in publisher and had it printed by vistaprint. I decided on the mustach theme because my dad has had his stash my whole life. Its so a part of him that no one even notices its there. To prove my point one of my dads friends asked me at his party "so why did you choose the mustach theme?" When I told her why she said "what mustache?" and noticed it for the first time.
I punched out the red and white confetti for the centerpeices from various circle punches I have laying around the house. Brandon modified the photos and added mustaches onto my dads 'kid' photos. I got vases from the dollar store and the green leaves came from a plant I had in my backyard. I went to purchase red flowers at the florest and they wanted two dollars a stem! I about fainted. I went to Wal-mart to print out the photos and found these red daisys for two dollars. Each plant had at least three flowers a piece. So now I have some cute flowers to plant in my backyard! To accent the tables I wanted to buy a fabric pennant banner but I couldn't afford what I wanted. So I bought some clearence fabric at joanns and sewed together a pennant banner that was black and white with red accents that said "Happy 70th Bruce" in the same text as the invite.
The mustaches on the plates, cups, and serve bowls I cut out using a die cut that I found online. I purchased chalkboard contact paper so they went on just like stickers and I was able to write what each item was in the serving bowls and the guests could write their names on their cups.
The most challenging part for me was the food. I don't know how to cook for more than 20 to 30 people and we had almost 70. So we rented a taco cart locally and I just made the orderves. Flautas, corn cakes, & empinatas and of course chips, salsa & guacamole (above). We had a seperate beverage station with Tea, Lemonaide & Punch. We also offered water and sodas under the table in ice chests. For desert we had a cake for my dad to blow out and a cupcake tower. The cupcake pix I made from paper straws and again the die cut but with black paper.
My amazing husband made our photo booth. We were originally going to create the photo booth for our 10 year annivarsary party (a year away still) but thought this was the perfect excuse to put it together and enjoy it sooner! We had a booth we had made for a previous party laying around so we painted that black and added a PVC frame and purchased some black curtians. I made a little prop station to go with it from an overnight case that was handed down throught the family. I tought it added some vintage flair. (I forgot the table to put it on so it ended up on the ground!). In it we had stick mustaches and stick chalkboard signs, coke bottle glasses, feather boa's and some miscilaneous crazy sunglasses and animial faces. Here are some photos from the booth