LOVE this cake!

It's black berry season.  I couldn't believe it when I was at the store the other day and they were selling for 50 cents a pack.   I loaded up my cart with plans to freeze some, use some for snacking and others for some of my favorite blackberry recipes.  

This is one of them:

Berry Bliss Cake

What you need:

1 pkg. (3.4 oz) JELL-O Vanilla Flavor Instant Pudding
3/4 cup cold milk
1-1/2 cups thawed COOL WHIP whipped topping, divided
1 cup each fresh raspberries and sliced strawberries
1/4 cup Blackberries
1 pkg. pound cake
1/4 cup Orange juice


How to make it:

Beat pudding mix and milk with whisk in medium bowl 2 min.  Stir in 1 cup cool whip.
Combine berries; reserve 1/2 cup
Cut cake into three layers
Brush cake layers with juice

Stack cake layers on plate, filling each layer with half each of the remaining berries and pudding mixture.  Top with remaining cool whip and reserved berries.  Refrigerate 4 hours.

Yum!!!

HERE is another one of my favorite blackberry recipes.

Copycat Mini Car Mat

I hope you're not too tired of these car mats yet . . . because I wanted to share mine too. Aren't they so much fun?

I thought the mats Jeanine made HERE and HERE were so darling that I copied her and made my own, but changed things up slightly.

Here's my take on it:

I used shoe laces to make the pump at the gas tank. (Thanks honey for sacrificing your old shoes for my project!)

. . . And a garage for your car to pull into at night.

These are so simple to make. All you have to know how to do is cut and iron. I made this one just like I did my dinosaur mat HERE.

Sidewalk Game

It's that time of year to be outside.  My daughter and I have loved playing this new sidewalk game.  We write all the letters of the alphabet (both upper and lower case) around our driveway.  We then take turns calling out a letter.  One of us runs to the uppercase letter and the other to the lower case letter.  

We're learning, having fun, and getting our energy out all at the same time!

Toy Story 3 characters

I found these Toy Story 3 characters that were meant to be turned into magnets.  Since I took the boys to see it a few weeks back they have been excited over every Toy Story 3 thing we've seen.  I wasn't planning on bringing a magnet board on our trip so I decided to make them for a flannel board. I printed, cut, laminated, cut, and then glued some felt to the back of my characters.

Originally I was going to make a mini flannel board for each boy until I realized that I had the back of the car mats!  Two-for-one!  One less thing to pack!

My 5-year-old also decided that Buzz, Woody, and the gang could play in the town as well.  Perfect!

Mini Car Mats--take 2 ( . . . and 3 and 4)

So I  finally finished my car mats!  My 5-year-old had many opinions about what I should make . . . so I used a lot of his ideas.  He insisted on having a red house.  (I really wanted a purple house a la Mr. Pine's Purple House . . . but I knew that eventually neither boy would want to play with the mat that had a purple house.  Oh well.)  

Originally I had planned to make the mats two-sided.  But then I got to 

thinking . . . after our trip is over my boys are still going to play with these (hopefully!)  So, I made each one separate so that they can piece them together and make one big town.

clockwise from the top: playground, house, Target (our favorite), church

clockwise from the top: forest, temple, zoo, house

 clockwise from the top: baseball diamond (we love baseball in this house), gas station, house, beach

and here is the entire thing together

The fun thing about it is that they can rearrange their town to be however they like it!


As promised I have the template for most of what a used.  They are all fairly simple shapes.

I believe that Amy will be sharing her version of the car mat soon.

I'd love to see what you come up with too!

 

Marble Travel Game

Need something to keep little hands busy while waiting at the doctor, the bank, or while traveling this summer?

Here's a little marble maze game that can fit right in your purse to pull out at a moments notice . . .

I started with two 4 1/2 x6 1/2 inch pieces of fabric.

With right sides together I sewed a small quarter inch seam around the edge, leaving a small opening.

Clip corners, then turn right side out.

Sew the maze pattern on your fabric ( make sure you leave enough room for the marble to go through the maze), put the marble inside and then sew up your opening.

Super simple. Super fun.

I bet you even have the supplies just hanging around your craft room waiting to be used, don't you?

Go ahead. Give it a try. You'll be done in five minutes. Promise . . .

Airplane Tray Cover--Post Edit

While I've been gathering ideas to keep my older two boys busy on the plane I've been at a loss as to what to do for my 13-month-old. I saw these airplane tray covers for sale... but honestly I'd rather spend my $25 elsewhere. I'm not a seamstress by any stretch of the imagination (that's Amy's forte) so I usually don't tackle sewing projects. Besides, I hate lugging my sewing machine out! But this was so easy and inexpensive that I think anyone could do it!

Here are the things I used for my cover (some I had around the house, others I had to purchase):

3 coordinating fabrics

7-inch zipper

felt

ric-rac

practice golf ball

ribbon

buttons

First off, I had to know the dimensions of the trays. I used my awesome research skill (Google) and found that the trays were pretty much standard--16 1/2" x 9 1/2" (some said up to 10 1/2"). So I cut my fabric 1/2" longer than that for a seam allowance. You'll want to cut the length at least 20" because you will fold it in half (and that's one less seam you'll have to sew).

The first thing I did was sew the top edges (just 1/2"). Before sewing the sides up I added all my "activities."

The zipper was pretty easy--just sewed all around the edges. You could even do something fun and have something inside the zipper.... I just left it alone.

Next was the peek-a-boo door. I cut 2 equal sized rectangles of felt and then cut one of those in half. The other I adhered Heat-n-Bond to. I fused the back piece onto my large fabric and then sewed the doors on (so that they were sewn to both the large fabric and the back piece of the door.)

I then cut out a simple lion out of felt (with Wonder Under on the back) and fused those to my back piece.

And finally I hot glued some buttons as door knobs.

Because I have been busy making car mats for my older boys I didn't want my baby to get jealous (he loves whatever his brother's do) I cut and fused a little road to his cover. Again... I just used Heat-n-Bond (or Wonder Under). I choose to sew around it... just for looks.

Next, I took some fabric and fashioned a little pocket embellished with some ric-rac. I also made a small heart and stuffed it with a walmart sack so it would be crinkly when he played with it. I got carried away with the pocket and forgot to sew on the ribbon first... so I ended up doing that by hand.

My little one loves to throw balls. Since that really won't be an option on the plane (he throws hard and far and thinks it really funny to throw it at people not paying attention) I came up with another solution. Hopefully he's entertained by it! I found those practice golf balls with holes in them (a whole pack at Walmart was less than $2), tied a ribbon to it and attached it to the cover. Just to reinforce it I fused a star-shaped piece of felt over my stitching.

Ta-da! That's it! Really, it was pretty easy. (Hopefully it keeps my baby entertained!)

If you make one I'd love to see what you come up with!


I'm linking to these parties this week.

** Yesterday I got the chance to try my tray cover out... and it was too small in width!!!  So although everything I found said that the trays were 16 1/2 inches wide I'd make the final product at least 17 1/2.  It's better to be too big than too little.

Mini Car Mat-- Take 1

It's summertime! And for most people summer = travel. We are no exception. However, this year we are traveling to Alaska. Alaska = long plane ride. I have been racking my brain trying to come up with things that will keep my 3 boys busy while we are trapped on a plane with no option to take a break and run around.


One of the ideas I came up with was a car mat. It needed to be small enough to fit on their airplane tray. I really liked this idea but thought my boys would get bored after too long. I needed something more like this. The problem with making the entire mat 8 1/2 x 11 is that the road still has to be as big as the car. This doesn't leave much room for buildings and such.

To make it a little sturdier, I put some wonder under on another piece of 8 1/2 x 11 green felt and fused my town to it.


Sorry I don't have a good tutorial . . . I was winging it as I went along. Basically, I used the same idea as Amy's Dinosaur Play Mat. I will have a pattern for the pieces that I used--stay tuned. I am making a few more of these (I have to have at least one for each boy!)


I'm linking to these parties this week.