DIY Rustic Party Decoration or Party Favor Stamped Wood Rounds

Let us get back into things! I have been SO BUSY! Between printing, packing, shipping, and yard work.. there is only coffee, sleep, and repeat.

I was sorting through my wood rounds last night, and realized that I am left with only a small handful of wood rounds that are 2.5-3 inches wide. Everything else is much smaller.. So until I get some more cut I had to deactivate my current shop listings. While thinking about how I lack a variety in my shop I started playing around with my small wood rounds and some stamps that I have.. A light bulb flicked on and I knew I had a blog post lined up(finally)!

Obviously all of you know how to dab an ink pad and stamp, but things like this sometimes are just too simple to really connect. I have had these things lying around and never really thought about stamping on them. You could also skip the drilling, and hot glue the wood rounds to a magnet!

They make adorable decorations for a bridal shower, or toss them in a cellophane bag with a bow for engagement party favors!

The 'All you need is Love' stamp was made by ::  Paper Sushi (I LOVE all of Jen's work)
The 'Time to Drink Champagne and Dance on the Table' stamp is a East of India brand and is hard to find in the U.S. I purchased mine off of Ebay from a shop in the UK.


Now get crafting! The ideas are endless!

Our 5 Year Anniversary

Wayne and I are not married.. You wouldn't know it though based on how we spent our 5 year anniversary. We wanted to take a trip somewhere.. But the weather sucks. So we thought we would hold off on that, and maybe just do dinner and a movie. We haven't been to a movie in a long time. Just before we were supposed to get ready to leave.. We started talking about what we need to do around the houses, and to improve the yard. Basically how to get rid of some of this mud/dirt. We got all excited on these ideas.. We were going to take our DAY OLD truck to the store and buy the supplies that we need for the new projects. That's right.. We just bought a new (old) workhorse truck, and spent our 5 year anniversary in the lumber yard! I kill me. I brought a camera with us, because I thought that our hilarious 5 year anniversary should be documented.. Our house and ideas are too important to care about a silly date that we were only going to go on because we "had" to do something for our anniversary. I say... Just plan a trip! I like to look forward to things!
For now we work, and get joy out of the action of improving our landscape.

We completed our gravel walkway!

..and a retaining wall for the driveway. We had gravel delivered to level it out, and get rid of the mud! Yay, progress! I am also planting new grass, and we got a wood splitter to help us out with all of this wood! The loggers said they guess that we have 40 cords of wood.

Romantic..

A New Start

I must admit.. I have been in hiding. I have been trying to figure out how to make this post for a couple of weeks now. Here goes!
Our property is covered in old growth doug fir trees(150 yrs+). The house was build literally surrounded by trees, and they have been untouched until today. We made the decision after our recent, and frequent wind storms. The trees surrounding the house's had to go for our safety now and in the future. Living so close to these massive trees made the house feel like a modern tree house. Now we have a mountain cabin, and the landscape is getting a new start. The previous owners were not smart about the trees. They topped a lot of them for satellite TV. So the trees grew back deformed, and top heavy. All of the trees fought for sunlight too. So the majority only had foliage on the tops, which also makes the tree top heavy.
We want to be smart this time around for future generations, but this means we are in for the long haul. We have our work cut out for us that's for sure. The cleanup is going to take some time, but we are damn determined.. This is our home. It will get done as soon as humanly possible. Once complete - I say it is time for a good long relaxing vacation! :)

But on the bright side (literally) we have tons of light for our garden, and for the trees to grow properly. We also now have a lake and mountain view!
This is our livingroom view before:

and after:

Valentine's Day Goodies

I am sending some goodies out to the ones I love, and my old co-workers. There is only 9 days till Valentine's Day! Here is what I have in store for them:

Rifle Paper Co. post cards. I was having a bad day, and saw these.. I just had to get them. Knowing they were on their way to me made my bad day better! I then searched around for some organic candy to send with these adorable cards. I found Surf Sweets fruity candy hearts. Read up on them HERE. I bought 60 bags! Perfect! Now if I can just send them out before I eat them all.

Hopefully I can inspire some of you to spread the love ALL AROUND. This world needs more love in it. It can cure so many things. ♥ There is still plenty of time to plan.

I also wanted to share the Valentine's day tote bags that I made this year. Check out my shop! Lots of new products have been listed lately.

Tomorrow we are expecting MORE snow.

Jennifer's Birthday Celebration

Remember this girl? I have known Jennifer for about 14 years now. I made her a special birthday dinner the other night. Lemon dill baked salmon with rice, veggies, sparkling wine, and a Boston cream birthday cake with a single pink candle. I made sure to let her know not to waste this birthday wish. I told her to put ALL of her heart, and energy into this one single exhale. Hoping that moment of positive energy will bring good things, and possibly her wish WILL come true!
Her and her boyfriend stayed over for a couple of nights, and the weather cooperated! We took advantage and went for a little day drive out to the waterfalls.

We had to hike to the falls in the snow. 3 out of 4 of us did not have the right shoes on for this adventurous hike, making the experience hilariously memorable.

We went on down the road a little bit, and ended up at Odell Lake Resort for lunch. The frozen lake was a treat to see. We made sure these city slickers were not easily going to forget this trip.

All of the food on the menu is fresh, homemade, and delicious!

As always our adventure was a blast, and I think our guests had a great weekend "away from it all".

Our First Wind Advisory at the Homestead

Wayne and I were entertaining guests that had just arrived at our house when a wind storm picked up. There was so much debris in the yard, and I said, "Whoa this is crazy!" Then Wayne suggested they bring the cars closer to the house. As soon as he said that 2 trees fell knocking over a 3rd tree and one of them dented our guests rental car. The guys instantly went to work clearing out the driveway.. The ladies and I stood watching from the window. It was how I imagine hurricane winds to be. I saw Wayne start running towards the house and I looked out at the wind directly head on. The debris was blowing down and back up at the house hitting the windows. We looked out at the yard and saw another tree had fell. We all felt in danger. The only thing I could do was watch where the wind was coming from, and watch the trees. If I saw one coming towards us we were going to run to the opposite side of the house. The whole experience was unreal. We expect that we had 40+ mph wind gusts. Our guests wanted to get out of here ASAP! It was going to be dark soon, and they wanted to be able to see the roads and be able to call us to meet them if there was something that fell on the road. I insisted on staying at a hotel if this kept up. No way in hell I would be able to sleep seeing what we just saw. Trees are snapping like twigs! Somehow as our guests left so did the wind. What are the chances?! We are QUITE embarrassed by their experience of our property.. 

The tree we thought fell in the yard was actually half of the top of this tree below. 

On the plus side:

We have TONS (literally) of new firewood!

Also Kola brightens things up a bit. She doesn't have the slightest clue as to how much work this storm has caused us, but she is just filled with joy that we were all outside and able to throw toys for her in between hauling, raking, and cutting the debris & trees. She helps us take mental breaks from the work and keeps us laughing.

What a goober pants! ♥

SUNRIVER - A Great Start to the New Year

Wayne has a friend visiting from Hawaii and he and his fine lady wanted us to come out to Sunriver to catch up on things. We have also been dying to go out to the observatory! Having watched 4 Seasons of The History Channel's "The Universe" (so far). We have been looking for an opportunity just like this. You also can't beat the views both of snowy mountains, and perfect starry nights.
Our visit was a blast. Great food, and company. We had intellectual conversations with a side of sparkling wine and a movie night. My kind of people!

We showed up for the solar viewing to see the sun up close, and we had just missed a solar flare an hour earlier but could still see remnants of it. The photo of the sun is the photo that the Observatory at Sunriver posted on their facebook page. I couldn't help but share exactly what I saw! 

These are also photos from their facebook page down below. I couldn't capture the mind blowing experience in my camera without a tripod, but wanted you to see exactly how beautiful the view was(I'll be more prepared next time).

Visit the Observatories website HERE.