Buggin'

Spring is in the air! Along with an infestation of ladybugs. There are worse things. Like an infestation with... Wel... Any other bug, really.

These are just the ladybugs that I could get in one frame!!! How awesome is that!!!



I'll make this one into a giveaway... The first person to get the correct number of ladybugs in all the pics in this post will win a box of ladybug cookies!!! Post your answer in the comments and I will sit back and let you do the countin'. Remember, it's about ALL the ladybugs in ALL the pics!

**A small change, just to make sure you won't just guess, there will be a winner chosen randomly among the people who had the right answer!**

They are pretty though.



The little man and his little stone bunny think so too.

Indian summer

How crazy is that! While New Jersey is having the first snow storm of the season, we are having better weather than we had all summer!!! While writing this, the little man is playing outside, walking around with his bare feet, in the back yard.

The munchkin is not having so much fun. She is sleeping, trying to adjust to daylight saving time, sleeping off her no-travel jet-lag And trying to recover from an eye infection. Poor thing!

A day at the zoo

No craftiness today... We spent the morning at the zoo. A small one, close by, but the dynamic duo didn't care! They spent the day petting, playing and sliding. They love the playgrounds even mo than the animals. That didn't stop them from petting the one month old goats. Too cute! The little man was really gentle!

Flowers

Another perfect summer day. The perfect day for the munchkin to cut some more flowers from our flower patch. We used to have a vegetable patch, but we didn't use it any more. So the munchkin and I decided to grow flowers instead.

From a distance it doesn't look like much...



But when you look closer, there are some really pretty flowers in there...








The munchkin was too busy playing in the sandbox with the little man to help mommy cut the flowers... Never mind! I just want them to have fun!!!

Cake pops tutorial...

Haha, fooled you! I did try to make a cake pop tutorial, and I almost finished it, but it's been so extremely hot the last couple of days that the chocolate melted so fast I couldn't take any decent pictures... It just would not set!!! And we are not used to these temperatures here, so no AC... This is what it's like in my back yard...

A day at the zoo

Today we went to Fuengirola Zoo. We had a great time! I love the fact that this is a zoo without bars anD lakes, but with the animals in beautiful living areas behind safety glas!!! So you can actually stand next to a huge gorilla and walk alongside the tigers... They are not easily startled anyway, they are used to people being in their faces....

But the best thing about this zoo is that you can walk across the island where the lemurs live!!! Sooo cool! The dynamic duo loved it!

The little man is pointing at the meerkats...



The munchkin loves the big kitty...



And mommy loves the lemurs!!!

Still alive!!!

Oh yes, we are still here! Or rather, we are there. We are enjoying a family vacation in Torremolinos, Spain. And since we are here enjoying sun, sea and great food, and you're not, I would like to share some of our little man's day with you!

Hmmmmmm... Like it...



Want it!!!



Go burro, go!!!



And now for some good eatin'!



Isn't he just too cute for words!!!

Pick a giveaway winner tutorial

This morning we (yes, I had an assistant) picked the giveaway winner! The only problem... How to be fair? So we decided on a raffle...

I cut some cards for the names...



Then I wrote down the names on the cards...



All the names went in the top hat (that my husband wore at our wedding)...



And my lovely assistant picked a card!



And the winner is....



Congratulations Artmind! Please e-mail me at maaikee@yahoo.com with your address!!!

Afterwards, my lovely assistant had a great time playing with the hat!



Thank you all for joining the giveaway... Better luck next time!

Next up: a tutorial for a cute fathers day gift...

Poem

Last week I was in Den Bosch for my cake-decorating course at De Taartwinkel. An hour early, so I decided to take a walk to the city center. And then I ran into this poem, that was painted on the side of a building. I thought it was so sweet, I just had to take a pic and share it with you.



Translation for the non-Dutch:

THE INFLUENCE OF MEDIOCRE WIND ON YOUR CLOTHES

                             Are you going to the beach? When you
      get back, can I have the sand
                                                           from your shoes for

                         the bottom of my fish tank?

Nature bursting at the seams

Today was a beautiful day. Sunny, bright, not too cold, a perfect end to winter. Everywhere you look there are blossoms and buds. I love this time of year! Just look at the blooming back yard we have here...






Tomorrow it's cake time...

Kidsproof camera tutorial

Sorry I didn't post yesterday, but I was exhausted after my husbands birthday. Especially since the dynamic duo decided not to sleep, eat or play. But I understand that a birthday in the family is a huge event when you're one or two years old!!!

I'll show you the lego cake later, but I can't promise you tutorial-lovin' folk a tutorial and not deliver. So here it is... The ultimate kidsproof camera!

Our delightful model showing the camera:


It's super easy to make! Just download this pdf to your pc and print the file on some cardstock. Follow the instructions and you could be the proud owner of a real unbreakable camera! Of course you can't take actual pictures with it, but nevertheless, it looks fun, huh?

This is what the file looks like:


So take out your scissors, glue and go crazy!

1 year old!!!

Yay! Our little boy is officially not a baby anymore... Bas turned one today. He got lots of presents that he, quite unexpectedly, liked more than the wrapping paper. Like his sister, he got his own cake that he could play with, and he ate lots of 'poffertjes' (like small pancakes, typically Dutch) for dinner. He had a great time, and he fell asleep as soon as we put him down. A small impression of the cake-fest:





Of course I used the mystery item that I showed you yesterday... It is made so that I can change the name and the age, multi-functional, so I can use it for his sister as well!!!

Guess where we went!!!

Guess where we went skiing!!! Our week in pictures...





And I figured out what I wanted to make for my boy's first birthday!!! I haven't been able to hang it yet, but here is a sneak preview... It's not his birthday yet anyway... ;-)



More tomorrow! I'll probably be exhausted by the end of the day...

Nostalgia

Another Dutch tradition! When I was a little girl, a long, long long time ago, all little girls had a so called Poesie-album. It was a little book where all your friends and family would write down a little rhyme, or a sweet verse, and they would decorate it with all kinds of adorable little pictures that you could get, with flowers and butterflies and doggies and kitties, and all kinds of things sooo cute, they would give you an instant toothache. Some even had sparkles! I loved those pictures!

And... Good news for all nostalgia lovers... They are back! I recently found them in craftstores and bookstores! Yay! So let me share something that makes me really happy on a drab day like today!

(I'm probably breaking all kinds of copyright laws by showing you these, but I have no clue who to aks for permission...)








More nostalgia soon!