Firecrackers!

I saw firecrackers on Pick Your Plum a couple of weeks ago and knew I had to make some! I cut my wood different heights, sanded the ends, and drilled a hole in the top for the "fuse".

I decided I would mod podge mine instead of painting them. I cut my strips of paper just slightly smaller than the wood.

Simply mod podge them on {under the paper, and on top-for those of you who are new to mod podge} and let them dry! I put a layer of mod podge on the top face of the blocks, and stuck in a piece of jute twine. It will dry that way as long as you get some mod podge in the hole.

After they're dry, group them together and tie with twine. :)

U2 {360 Tour}

This past weekend my husband and I joined another couple in Anaheim for the U2 360 tour! It has been a dream of mine to see U2 in concert, and not something that I thought would ever happen. Check out their set-up...it's crazy looking!Lenny Kravitz was the opening act.

Angels Stadium was completely packed and we were on the fifth {and highest!} level. Every time the whole crowd would sway, jump or dance, the ENTIRE stadium would wiggle and shake! Seriously it was so bad that we had to sit down a couple of times just to keep our balance!! Talk about freaky! It felt like we were creating an earthquake!

The circular screen was actually a bunch of little screens on a retractable web and at one point, it stretched out...crazy!

There was even a red "steering wheel-looking" round microphone that Bono could swing across the stage on. There were also two bridges from the stage to the outer circles that move. I can't imagine how much it costs to produce this show! If I ever have the chance to see them again...I'll take it! In a heartbeat!

Taste of Orange Blossom {Roasted Chicken and Almond Prawns with Schezuan Sauce}

My mom is visiting us from Ohio, so tonight I introduced her to Orange Blossom. She's heard and read so much about it that I HAD to take her. She ordered the other special of the night, Smoked Pork Chop with Spicy Apple Butter and she LOVED it! Click on the link if you'd like to read my previous post on that special! Now, onto tonight's...I ordered the special salad, which tonight was an Avocado Salad with Red Pepper Dressing and topped with a scoop of Beet Sorbet. I never get tired of this salad. It's delicious week after week!

Here is the Roasted Chicken Breast and Almond Prawns with Schezuan Sauce! I've never tasted their schezuan sauce and I thought it was SUPER tasty! It was spicy and packed full of flavor!

The prawns are perched on top of the chicken, and the chicken is presented on Parmesan Polenta. It's a beautiful presentation. You "eat" with your eyes first and this dish total has the "ooh and ahh" factor when it's set in front of you!

The chicken was JUICY and SO flavorful! The great thing is that even though it has the top part of the bone for presentation, it's cut off of the back part of the bone, so everything you see, you can eat. There are no bones to mess with on the back part of the breast. I've never had chicken served like that and I thought it was fabulous! The flavor that is in this chicken is great! True roasted flavor.

The almond prawns were delicious as always, but had an extra layer of flavor with the schezuan sauce! This plate was packed with flavor! It was served with Snap Peas, Candied Carrots, and Garlic Bread.

Since I'd already had the special dessert for the blog, I thought I'd blog about my mom's dessert: The Almond Joy!

This is on their regular dessert menu but I've never tried it because I've never been big on coconut. To my surprise, I really liked it!! It's amazing how your taste buds change with passing time. The Almond Joy is a chocolate ganache tart, topped with homemade coconut rum sorbet, drizzled with hot fudge and white chocolate, and sprinkled with sliced almonds! To top it all off it has coconut all over the whole thing! Wowzers! If you like coconut, you'll LOVE this dessert! Promise! {And you might even like it if you THINK you don't like coconut!} ;)

We had a wonderful dinner...even if my mom did make me eat at elderly time! Ha ha! Check out their location, menu, hours and sign up for the email list here!

Peace Party! {Red and Turquoise!}

Today I got to set up for the beautiful red and turquoise peace party I've been planning. It turned out beautiful! Take a look...The fabric tablecloth is from Beverly's. Their fabric is SO expensive, but it's BEAUTIFUL! This fabric is what I built the whole party around!

I made the famous Cinnamon Crunch Popcorn and set it up in polka dot cones from Shop Sweet Lulu.

I ordered cookies from the fabulously talented Nandie! She even put red sugar crystals on the peace sign, not sure if you can tell from the pictures. They look PERFECT, as always! I don't know HOW she does it!

I made this sign using my Silhouette software and printing it on my regular printer. I love that feature of the Silhouette!

I think it's really cute to set the birthday girl's cupcake in it's own dome. It makes it extra special!

I made all three cake plates myself, I've had them for awhile. I also created the cupcake toppers using my Silhouette. I bought red and white polka dot cupcake liners from Shop Sweet Lulu. The homemade butter cream is dyed with Wilton's "sky blue" dye.

Here is the candy bar! The treat bags are also from Shop Sweet Lulu. I already had the tray and glass jars. I cut peace signs on my Silhouette from red vinyl and added them to the jars without the chalkboard labels.

I made these little signs too, I think the pennants are SO cute!

I was in Morro Bay this week and picked up some Carousel Salt Water Taffy in strawberry and raspberry! Perfect and delicious!

While at the coast, I also spotted these rock candy sticks! I'm so glad I thought to buy them! They look so cute! The two skinny jars got a pretty matching ribbon.

The big jars wouldn't fit a big wide ribbon so I added twine in both colors and tied a bow around the lids. Yeah....I pretty much never leave "well enough" alone. Ha ha. Everything has to have bows and labels.

The tissue balls also came from Shop Sweet Lulu. Told ya she's my secret weapon!

Hope you like it!

Linking up to Inspiration for Celebration's link party!

Taste of Orange Blossom {Canadian Lobster Tail wth Chicken Skewer}

Friday night we had the pleasure of three other couples join us for dinner at OBJ. It was fun to switch it up and have no shortage of conversation among friends. I love my friends! Ok, now onto the food! As I mentioned last week, I planned on asking George to take a picture so that you could put a face-to-the-food. He told me he wanted his kitchen staff in the picture with him because they work SO hard! I think that's awesome...giving credit, where credit is due! I've had the pleasure of glimpsing these people work in the kitchen and I KNOW how seriously they take their job! They really care about the food they send out for YOU to eat! It's a beautiful thing to know that George is now imparting his food knowledge onto them, because once upon a time, someone (or some people) taught him. Good food really is an art.

Tonight's special salad was the Avocado Salad with Red Pepper Dressing, topped with Beet Sorbet. It was delicious as always! My hubby and I were having fork wars over this salad! I got up to take the picture in the kitchen, and when I came back he had eaten most of it! MY salad! Haha.

I was SUPER excited to hear that one of the night's specials was a 5 oz. Canadian Lobster Tail with a Chicken Skewer and served with White Chocolate Lemon Butter. This is my FAVORITE sauce! I had this sauce once, on a fish special and I couldn't wait to eat it again! You can just taste the hint of the white chocolate in the sauce and to me, it makes it take on that velvety smoothness. It was delicious! The lobster was cooked perfectly and the sauce added that great flavor! I loved swirling my chicken in the sauce too!

It was served with Candied Carrots, Snap Peas, Potato, and Garlic Bread! Look at those HUGE chunks of bacon in the the snap peas! Heck yes! Everything's better with bacon!

The dessert special was a Warm Apricot Tart with Apricot Sorbet. It was drizzled with caramel and white chocolate! This sorbet was like none I have ever tasted! The texture of it was out-of-this-world creaminess! It's so hard for me to put into words, but it's almost like what you would imagine the texture of satin flowing in the breeze tasting like...if it had a taste! :) It was soooo good, and almost had a hint of an orange taste to it. The tart underneath had a delicious crust, and sometimes you just can't beat a warm tart and cold ice cream on top! Fab-U-lous!

Thanks again for a wonderful night OBJ! Here's the easy link to their site for more info and the full menu!

Paris Party!

Today was finally the day! We celebrated Cami's sixth birthday with a pink poodle in Paris party! She is obsessed with pink poodles. This was a really fun theme for me to plan, and it turned out beautiful!

The kids ate and played outside.

I hung tissue puffs and garlands.

I realized I needed something on the table this morning so I whipped this up with stuff from my house. I used my dress me up plate, and added the pink ribbon, topped it with an Eiffel Tower, and used a dry erase marker to write "Happy Birthday Cami!"

The poodle and Eiffel Tower cookies are from my friend Nandie. She makes the most unbelievable cookies you've ever seen!

I bought pink gumballs and cut an Eiffel Tower out of black vinyl on my silhouette. The mini chocolate bars are wrapped in Paris and Happy Birthday wrappers.

I love this single glass stand. I put the birthday girl's cupcake in it. The Paris decor was on clearance at Hobby Lobby.

I borrowed a cake stand from my sister in law...it's made out of hat box lids and candlesticks.

I followed a tutorial on how to make frosting look like a rose. It was SO easy!

I used the tutorial from Shindig Party TO GO to make the chocolate covered oreos.

Pink and white striped paper straws and pink lemonade!

I passed out mini marshmallows and we had a spitting contest.

The kids thought it was hilarious. We played three rounds.

Here is the three-time champ!

I found a pink poodle pinata in Ohio and my mom shipped it to me. It was only ten bucks!

We had to have daddy step in and help break it open after everyone had at least one turn. It wasn't budging.

Dessert time!

My beautiful birthday girl!

Silly girl thought her cupcake wrapper was a crown. :)

Frosting noses!

These are the boxes each girl got to take home. I added the Eiffel Tower myself.I stenciled these tote bags that I bought for half off at Hobby Lobby. Each girl got one of these in her tote bag with her initial on it. After stamping Cami's name first, I realized it would be too much work and switched to a large initial.I made these fabric rosette headbands and packaged them in these cute bags I bought from Shop Sweet Lulu.Each girl also had one of these cute tiny chevron bags filled with pink gumballs. These bags are also from Shop Sweet Lulu.

She was so thankful for everything and so happy to spend the day with her friends. She told me it was "the best party ever". And THAT makes it all worth it! ;)