Valentine Sharing Time 2011

I think having one linky for the month that is re-posted each week looks like it's going to work well. We've had around 100 entries so far, for January and I think that's a great start!

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The Raising Memories Sharing Time for Valentine's Day has started. It will remain available until the end of February. Please add a link to your greatest blog posts about activities to do with your children or fun projects that you have done that are related to Valentines Day!
(They don't have to be from this year- just link to any great posts of yours with Valentine Ideas)

[Note: any entries that are not related to Valentines Day will be deleted- please add them to the regular Sharing Time Linky!]

If you're participating in Sharing Time,
please copy the code below & paste it
into where you can edit the html of
the post you've shared.
<a href="http://heathernow.blogspot.com"><img src="http://i54.tinypic.com/10gfo8x.jpg"/></a>

P.S. If you haven't already, don't forget to enter the CSN Stores giveaway that's going on at the blog right now!

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1. Conversation Hearts 2. Heart Cards, Red Ted 3. Valentines' day 1 4. Valentines' day 2 5. Valentines' day 3 6. Valentines' day 4 7. Valentine's Day fun! 8. V day bouquet 9. crafting w/ my kid 10. Heart Attack 11. Sweetest Necklace 12. Heart Garland 13. Treasure Hunt 14. Sun Catcher 15. Love Letter Books 16. Valentine Bed 17. Kiss Cards 18. Valentine Toast 19. Candy Cane Cake 20. CrayonWax Suncatcher 21. Valentine's Prints 22. vday sensory tub 23. Kool aid Play Dough 24. heart presents 25. sweet on math 26. hearts & arrows 27. vday tray activities 28. Lovely Bubbles 29. VALENTINE FLOWER PIN 30. Valentine's Gift 31. Framed Photo Collage 32. No Bake Cupcakes 33. Valentine Sensory 34. DIY Feather Earrings 35. Vday Sensory Bin 36. Valentine Printable 37. Easy Centerpiece 38. V-Day Sensory Bin 39. Valentine Wreath 40. Hole Punch Puzzles 41. Broken Hearts Puzzle 42. ABC = abc 43. Shaken Paint Hearts 44. 14 days of Valentine 45. CHANDELIER EASY DIY 46. Valentine Tree 47. Edible Valentines 48. Sensory Activity Box 49. Sensory Activity Box 50. Ballerina Valentine

Hey everyone, the Valentine Linky is still open until the end of the month!

Teddy Bear's Picnic

We had a Teddy Bear's Picnic party at our house recently!

Here's what we did:

(more in order of pictures than of how we did it ;)1. Each visitor got a party hat for themselves & a matching one for their Teddy Bear.
2. Treat bags consisted of party blowers, teddy grahams, gummie bears, play doh, and silly bandz.


3. We played pin the bowtie on the Teddy Bear.
4. We played Musical Chairs (no losers- when you were "out" you went to get your face painted)
5. We played "Hullabaloo" while waiting for parents to pick kids up


6. We opened a big picnic basket to find dishes for each child & their bear, and set up the picnic
7. We made a teddy bear cake!


8. We played "spin the rootbeer bottle" to decide which gift to open.
9. I marveled at how cute the kids were, watching Talia open her gifts. They were all so involved!

Recharged

Yesterday I got to go with my little sister to pick my parents up at an airport across the border in the U.S. (While we've been dealing with "snowmagedon", they've been in Florida for 10 days- lucky them!) We left early (by several hours) so that we could do some shopping. It was great! I got stuff with my birthday money & it was fun to spend time with my sister :)

Since we got home late, I stayed over at my parents' house & drove home this morning. Yesterday was a nice little break from Mommyland, and a chance to recharge my batteries, so to speak. Now I'm back to regular life, having some computer time (and eating leftover ice cream cake) while the girls "nap" (actually I can hear them singing together in their room- which is cute, but if I hear footsteps, I'm going up there to lay down the law ;)

It's good to be back :)

The CSN Stores Gift Code giveaway is ending tomorrow. If you're reading this, and you want an extra entry, just go, post a comment on the giveaway post that says "recharge" and you'll get another chance at winning. :) Thanks for reading!

Rainbow Cake

For Talia's "Family Party", she wanted a rainbow theme. This is the rainbow cake that I made for her: I only did one layer of round cake, and that really wasn't a big enough cake for all of the family we had over (luckily we had some ice cream to go with it, but next time, I hope I'll remember that we need something larger!) I was really happy with the way that it turned out, though! Now that I've made a couple of cakes recently, I'm feeling ready to conquer something bigger... I've got plans for an even cooler rainbow cake for St. Patrick's day... ;)

If you're looking for other rainbow ideas, there are a bunch in my St. Patrick's Day Ideas Roundup!

Teddy Bear Cake

We needed a Teddy Bear Picnic Cake for Talia's Teddy Bear's Picnic Birthday Party this year!
Here's how I made a Teddy Bear Face cake:

Teddy Bear Cake

You can tell from the pictures how I made it, I think. It's a very simple teddy bear cake design that anyone can do without a mold or a lot of experience!

1. 'Glue' the ears on with frosting before frosting the whole cake with light brown chocolate frosting.

Teddy Bear Face Cake

2. Frost the cake with light brown frosting

3. Draw the face on with a toothpick

4. Add the darker chocolate frosting, the white for the eyes, and the chocolate chips for the middle of the eyes.

Teddy Bear Picnic Cake

Note: I would've used black for the mouth & nose, but I don't have black food colouring. I was planning to use a grass tip for the bear, to try & make it look furry, but when it was time to frost the cake, I found out I don't have one of those tips ;) So, I improvised.

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Other Great Cake Posts:

Tangled Barbie Cake

Extra Easy Rainbow Layer Cake

Watermelon Ice Cream Cake

Kit Kat Candy Pile Cake

Ladybug Cake

Cake Frosted with a Rainbow on Top

Candy Cane Cake

5 Minute Microwave Chocolate Cake (Single Serving)

Swirly Rainbow Inside Cake

Pumpkin Roll (complete with photo & video tutorial)

Valentine Treat Toppers & Candy Bar Wrappers

I love this idea I've seen crop up all over blogland, of printable treat toppers. I also like the printable candy bar wrappers. Here are some cute Valentine ones that I have seen & bookmarked for future use:



1. Mini Treat Bag Labels from Sweet Metel Moments2. Mini Chocolate Bar Wrappers from a little lovely
3. Treat Toppers from it's a crafty life
4. Valentine Poster/Wrapper/Card from Beth at it is what it is5. Personalized Candy Wrappers from eighteen25
6. Frog Pack (includes tic tac toe game, etc.) from It's Always a Party at the Parkers
7. I missed this cute polkadot wrapper from the hands on housewife when I made the collage above:


Go check 'em out!