You "Light" Up My Life!

Thanks to Scotch(R) Double Sided Tape for sponsoring my writing about crafts. Add your comment below to be entered for a chance to win free sample rolls to help with your upcoming holiday needs.

This project is so easy it can be done holding a baby. ;) I have really wanted to have a focus more on gratitude and appreciating those around us this month. This is a fun idea to surprise someone who has made a difference in your life. I call it You "light" up my life.

Supplies needed:

• Black, red and green cardstock
• Double sided tape
• Scissors
• Black marker

You can literally finish this in 15 minutes or less. It could be a fun mutual or family home evening activity where you could choose some family members, neighbors or community members you admire.

1. Start off by cutting the light string out of black paper. It can be any shape you like, just squiggle it around. I kept mine about 1.5 inches thick so it would be sturdy to lift once I got it all put together. I overlapped the edges about 1/2 inch and secured with tape.

2. Next, add the little black rectangles where the lights will go. I made these about 1.5 x 2 inches so I could overlap them a 1/2 inch to secure with tape.

3. Now fold and cut your red and green paper in fourths. I placed the paper next to the rectangle and freehanded a light shape. Then, I cut it out and used it to trace the rest of the lights.

4. Once you have all the lights cut out write notes on each one about what you love and appreciate about that person. We did ours for daddy so I wrote notes from me and each of my boys. It could be fun to do this for grandparents, ward members, neighborhood elderly, etc. Also, be sure to write "You light up our lives!" on one of the lights.

5. Then comes the fun part, tape it to their door and let them know how much you appreciate them.

Want some free tape to get started with this and other holiday projects? Scotch(R) is giving away a roll of double sided tape to 10 lucky winners. Just leave a comment to enter!

Giveaway closes Friday, December 3rd. Good luck!

Please learn more about Scotch(R) Double Sided Tape and other Scotch(R) Products, and join the conversation on the Scotch(R) Brand Facebook Page and via Twitter. I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity, as I do.

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Winner of the Just Dance Kids Game is...

Nikki said...

My kids would love this. We have the just dance one. but this one would be perfect for my 4yr old.

Congrats!

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Feature Friday-Blog Swap with Joy Is At Home

Hello Little Tipsy Readers! I am Suzy and I have a little blog called Joy Is At Home. I am thrilled to be hanging out here today! Michelle's blog is one of the very first (I mean like first 5!) that I started reading and she got me addicted to craft blogging! She's amazing... even 2 weeks after having a baby! CONGRATS! So needless to say, I'm a HUGE fan & honored to be here!!

I am a {newly graduated} nurse and recently engaged, so wedding planning is right up there on my to do list! My fiance and I also built a house this year so I have been quite busy decorating {on a budget}! My blog is my creative outlet and it is full of tutorials for decorating, DIY gifts, accessories and crafts! I love to make stuff that is inexpensive... like this dishwasher magnet I made out of an old CD.

Or these felt flower headbands that cost under 25 cents each to make!

And these coasters that were made from terra cotta planters.

I also made this photo frame from a cabinet door I found for $1 at the Restore.

And replaced those icky, squirty bath & body works foam soap dispensers with these mason jars & a generic pump.

{I just realized that nothing I showed you in this post is over $5.00 and it's really making me feel like a cheap-o!}

Now, since it's the day after Thanksgiving and I just know you are all busy decorating your house for Christmas (wait, you did that 2 weeks ago like me?) I thought it was only fair to post a super quick & easy tutorial for you! So here goes!

When I saw this cutey-pie Christmas Tree in the Pier 1 adds, I knew I needed it! But $35.00? Really Pier 1? Since we've already established that I'm a cheapo, I'm sure you know what's comin!

I started off with glitter paper (found@HobLob), white paint, wood plaque (49 cents at Michaels), glitter and a foam paintbrush.

I first cut out my random sized circles and then made them into little pacmen.

I then made them into little cones. If you weren't using glitter paper, it'd be really easy to just glue or tape this. But since my paper had so much texture I had to use brads to keep them closed.

Once I did this, I stacked them and taped them on the inside. This is where it gets a bit messy. I painted the base and paintbrush handle white. After it dried I covered it in mod podge and then sprinkled with silver Martha Stewart glitter. I then used gorilla glue to attach the paintbrush to the base. My hands were so messy that I didn't think handling my camera was a good idea. Once they were stacked, I stuck a piece of wire through the top and cut out a star from the paper.

To attach the base and the tree, I cut out a piece of cardboard into a circle and taped it from the inside. I poked a hole through with my paintbrush and stuck it right in.

And here you have it! My knock-off Pier 1 Christmas Tree!

Thank you so much, Michelle, for having me! I hope you will stop by sometime soon! I love making new friends!

Have a wonderful day!

Suzy

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Um, that Christmas tree is super adorable! I feel a trip to Hobby Lobby coming on! Thanks for swappin' it up Suzy!

BTW Happy Black Friday everyone!!

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Thanksgiving Recipes by The Culinary Queen

Well hello there, "A Little Tipsy" readers! My name is Ashlee and I have a blog in blog land

called, The Culinary Queen Bee.

I want to say thanks to Michelle for letting me guest blog today. This is actually my very first guest blogging experience, so I am grateful for the opportunity and I am very excited!!

First off, I am very lucky to have the very wonderful job of being a Domestic Engineer (aka SAHM). I am a mother of two beautiful children, Kaleb who is 5 1/2 and Karmindy who is 2 1/2. I also have a wonderful Husband, his name is Mark. I have to give a shout out to him because he is my tech support man behind my blog. So thanks to my better half!

When you visit my blog you will learn about a few of my passions that I love share with my readers...

like that I am obsessed with

Diet Coke and Deep Fried Sushi (because everything is better when it is DEEP fried).

On my blog, I love to share my love of sewing and a few of the projects that I complete.

Sewing Lil' Guy ties, Making Beautiful Headbows and dresses for my princess ...

I also love to share craft ideas/tutorials on how to make your house more of a home, like my

Lil' Girl Bow Holder Tutorial

and my

Monogrammed Door Wreath Tutorial

My ALL-TIME favorite passion that I love to share is? (Hum the Jeopardy Theme Song just for fun) You guessed it! Food! I. LOVE. FOOD. The majority of my blog is dedicated to all things that involve FOOD.

Today, I wanted to share a couple of wonderful recipes for not only Thanksgiving morning but for the big feast as well! My first recipe is:

Pumpkin Doughnut Muffins!

(click on the link to see the full recipe)

This muffin recipe will be a sure fire way to impress your house guests with their cake like interior and their sugar coated exterior. These muffins are flavored with pumpkin puree and take on the feeling of fall. These muffins are very light and, served with an array of fruits, it would make for a healthy, light, but filling breakfast. These muffins will truly help tide your guests over until the big feast! This Muffin recipe is very easy to make and freezes well so you can enjoy the Holiday with your Family and Friends without the STRESS of cooking and fussing over everything on the BIG DAY. Who isn't for eliminating stress during the holiday season? If you do make and freeze these muffins ahead of time, all you have to do is remove them from the freezer, reheat in the oven, and then brush on butter and sprinkle with a cinnamon and sugar mixture.

Viola! Your Breakfast is covered for Thanksgiving Morning- Bonus!

Now for my all time favorite Thanksgiving Side Dish recipe:

Scrumptious Sweet Potato Casserole!

(click on the link to see the full recipe)

This sweet potato casserole is more of a dessert than a side dish because of the pecans, brown sugar, flour and butter topping. I will guarantee that when you serve this scrumptious casserole that your guests will rave and even those NON-SWEET POTATO EATERS will be IMPRESSED!!

With that, I hope that you will take the time to swing on by and see me in my part of the blog world and check out my blog and see what I have "cooking" up in my kitchen as well as in my craft room!

Ashlee, The Culinary Queen

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Thanks Ashlee! Those muffins look delicious and I just found out about a month ago that I actually do like sweet potatoes after 30 years of saying I don't. I guess I have been missing out!

The winner of the Fall Down Tree print is ...

tanya904 said... tweeted
http://twitter.com/starryeyed24/status/5436955915452416

Congrats!

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Just Dance Kids Giveaway-NOW CLOSED

We are a dancing family. Two of us were on drill teams and three of us were on college ballroom dance teams. We love to dance and we're not scared to show it. About a month ago my sister was in a competition at work with the other Vice Presidents to see who would be the champion of "Just Dance" while dressed up as past cast members from Dancing with the stars (she was a pregnant Bristol Palin). We had a crazy fun time practicing for her competition so when I was asked to review "Just Dance Kids" I jumped at the chance!

We started off with my 3 year old, 7 year old niece and their aunt. My son dropped out quickly not quite understanding he was supposed to copy the people on the tv (who were real kids BTW not animation, my sister was really surprised by that). He just watched, but my niece and sister had a great time.

We found there were three different modes: dance party (continuous songs without returning to menu), freeze and shake mode (gain extra points for shaking or standing still when queued), and team play (dance together for one score). The team play option may be good for smaller kids who feel bad when they lose. Then everyone can just celebrate what a big score they got together.

It didn't take long for us to wear out the kids and then it was the aunts turn to try it out. I think they may have had more fun than the kids. I had a good time watching and collecting blackmail footage.

Being the only one not participating in the dancing (too paranoid two weeks after a c-section) I noticed that there were words to the songs at the bottom of the screen and began to sing along. It's the prefect little karaoke opportunity for those who don't want to or can't dance.

After playing for a while we realized that whoever was holding the green controller got a considerable advantage and usually won. There was one point, as you can see in the video below, where my son actually put his controller away on the charger and still won his cousin who danced the entire time. I'm not sure if it was an issue with the controllers, but it was odd. We are not sure how the scoring is recorded and how to get the highest score, but we sure had a lot of fun.

Afterward, I asked my niece what she thought of the game.
She said, "It was awesome!"
"Oh, so you liked it?" I said.
"I didn't like it, I loved it!" she said.
"What was your favorite part?" I said.
"I liked the ABC song."

Won't she be surprised when she finds this under the tree!!

Do you want one under your tree too?! Ubisoft is giving away a Just Dance Kids game to a lucky Tipsy reader! (must be located in the continental U.S.)

To enter: Leave a comment

Extra entries: (leave a separate comment for each entry)

• Follow A Little Tipsy
• Like us on Facebook
• Follow us on twitter
• Tweet, facebook or blog about this giveaway and leave us the link

Giveaway closes Monday, November 29th. Good luck!

While Ubisoft provided me with this game to review, the opinions I've expressed here are solely my own and represent my honest viewpoint. Ubisoft, Clever Girls Collective and I promote Blog With Integrity.

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Boy Week: Puffy Paint

Hello Little Tipsy readers! I'm Ashlee from I'm Topsy Turvy, and I'm so excited to be here today sharing my boy craft with you! I have two boys of my own, I also have 2 girls. My girls are actually kind of Tomboys, so they enjoyed this craft as much as the boys did. I got this craft idea from my toddler's preschool teacher. He came home with the coolest art project. It was this strange puffy material. This is SO much fun, and I can't wait to share it.

It couldn't be simpler. You want equal parts elmer's glue and Foamy shaving cream. You can also use coloring (I used food coloring) if you want to.

Using a LARGE metal bowl pour in your glue. As a food handler I have to make sure I say this. Use metal because it's non porous and it will come completely clean. You wouldn't want to prepare or serve food in something that wasn't completely clean of the shaving cream and glue.

Next spray in the foamy shaving cream. You want there to be about equal parts. I tried to keep it at 4 oz each. It's all a guessing game. It will still work okay with a little too much or a little less. Although it might change the consistency.

Now you want to mix it all together. Mix it good.

One way to make sure it's mixed completely is to add color. Lego boy picked grey, boring, but it works, we could easily tell once everything was mixed together.

Now start painting! You can use anything you want. Forks, spoons, paint brushes...

fingers and hands... etc... Whatever you can think of!

My personal favorite? Baggies. I filled up sandwich bags with the foam and cut a corner. You can use cake decorating bag, I have a ton, but I thought the kids hands would have an easier time with this style than with decorator bags. It makes it easy to write with, or make lines.

Or like Lego Boy, "snakes". Here is his finished artwork. It stays puffy and soft when it drys. It's really very VERY cool! You'll love it. The kids still love to touch it and play with it after it's dried!

Here is what The Reader created, her own ocean with a little pink fish and grey clouds.

And mine. I wasn't really going for anything. Just playing and making globs. You can also use glitter, sprinkles, toys really anything you can think of to embellish it.

And if you have kids like mine They'll enjoy playing with the paint and much as they enjoy creating the artwork. The great news? It washes up easily! Off the kid, off the table, off the walls and where ever else your child is talented enough to get it!

So have fun creating your own puffy paint project with your little boy (or girl). It's cheap, easy, and oh so fun! I think I enjoyed it as much as the kids did. And once you think about it there are endless possibilities for this. Create your own 3D ice cream cone, car, decorate a picture frame, 3D hand print's, etc...

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Thanks Ashlee, I can't wait to try this out with my 3 year old. He will love it. I am totally going to add it to my Preschool at Home Can!

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