Pinteresting: Pill Box Gift

So here's the Pinspiration: Using a week-long pill dispenser as a week-long mini-gift dispenser! I found it on Pinterest, originally posted by The Sweetest Occasion; they used it for Valentine's Day, for 7 days of love.

I thought it was a super-cute idea, but I was hoping to figure out something other than just candy. Then I totally scored when I saw really big pillboxes at my local Goodwill near the cash registers! I picked up two, but I wish I'd picked up more. (I'm hoping my recipients will be understanding and let me steal the containers back so others can enjoy the gift.) Unfortunately, even a "Jumbo" pillbox is still only 1.5" by 1.25", so my options were severely limited. I had to get creative! Here's a similar sized one from Amazon: EZY Dose Weekly Pill Reminder

One reason I wanted to avoid an all-candy (at least in this first round, for my best friend N) is because she's been working on weight loss, and I didn't want to throw off her efforts TOO much; there is candy under ONE day, but it's a small amount, and I'll understand if she throws it away instead of eating it - hopefully it's the thought that counts! ;D

I did keep the little slips of paper idea, and changed it - each day got a loose "theme", and since I love me some alliteration, they all had cheesy names! Having 2 S's was a pain, though - Man, Saturday was FRUSTRATING to figure out, but I'm happy with what I came up with.

The weekdays/message/gift for this particular pillbox:

• Sippin' Sunday - Relax with a cold drink! (Individual drink packet, low-calorie Raspberry Lemonade)
• Manic Monday - Something sweet to help you get through Monday! (M&M's)
• Tricky Tuesday - Give yourself a brain-break with this (slightly) tricky puzzle! (Custom crossword puzzle)
• Wear it Wednesday - Here's some new bling to wear today! (dangly earrings I made)
• Treat Yo' Self Thursday - TREAT YO' SELF! ($5 bill)
• Finally Friday - It's Friday! GO NUTS! (Pistachios)
• SWEET, it's Saturday - Here's a reward for getting through this week!  (Redbox gift rental code, a fake diamond ring charm - N really loves jewelry, but I can't afford the good stuff ;D)

Now, some of these gifts are specific to my friend N, obviously; for example, the crossword puzzle I made her won't work for everyone else because I made it using our personal history as the clues. If you want to do something similar, I highly recommend using the website Armored Penguin for your puzzle-making needs - you can make crosswords, word searches, and word scrambles!

This is the "prescription" I included; I made it sturdier with some coordinating cardstock and edging scissors. I found the cute prescription image through Google (it's from Testy Yet Trying) and modified it using good ol' Fotoflexer.

Then I used good ol' Microsoft Word, made a table, and filled it with my "clever" messages and some pictures of us to put under the gifts. I used the ruler on the margins as a guideline to shrink the pictures correctly.

Sorry, no sneak peeks of the pictures - N would kill me if one of those pics was made public. ;D

I cut them out using my paper trimmer, put the pictures on the bottom of the boxes, filled the boxes, and folded the messages on top!

The pics I took for N's gift were too blurry - these are for my friend R's birthday (she LOVES Grumpy Cat!)

Also R's version - her gifts were slightly different

Aaaaand the messages (which conveniently hide the gifts!)

Voila! (We're back to N's gift now. Consistency is very important in blogging, as you can see.)

Finally, You have to give them the "prescription"! The way I do it is to print out the picture, cut some colorful card stock paper (if you want to cut the border with edging scissors, I recommend adding an inch to the height and width so you have plenty of room; if not using edging scissors, 1/2 an inch should be plenty to still look nice), and glue it. To tie it around the pillbox like I did, punch a hole in the corner, wrap your ribbon around the box at least twice, then feed one ribbon end through the hole and the other end will overlap one side of the card/hole - tie a knot, curl the ends. (If you REALLY don't get it, email me and I'll try a mini-tutorial of how to tie it.)

Back to R's box!

Now, as you may have surmised by now, I've shown examples from two separate pillboxes. N's gift was just for fun, whereas R's is for her birthday. It was part of R's overall bday gift - the pillbox was for the week leading up to her birthday, and then she has an actual gift in the bag pictured above. That is what's so fun about this gift - it can fit almost any occasion! It is tricky to come up with/find small stuff, but at the same time the creativity is fun, too!

Link parties I've joined

Fiesta Friday: A Foster-Parent Shower of Love

About 2 years ago, our friends the J's started the process to become foster parents. For miscellaneous reasons beyond their control, it wasn't until May that they were finally finished all the requirements and were approved for foster parenting!

They don't have their own kids, but Mrs. J has worked with kids before and had some kid stuff around the house. They also bought enough basics to get any kids by in the meantime (like, you know, BEDS), but they still needed a lot of basics that most parents accrue over time - and they kind of need it, you know, ASAP.

So, our mutual friend R and I decided to shower them with love! The J's are good people and they definitely deserve to experience a "baby" shower. The only catch is the youngest kiddos they'll be housing are 4-year-olds. So we called it a "Shower of Love"!

Mrs. J requested lime green and white for the colors, so we gave her lime green and white! ;D

R handled the invitations, food, and half of the decorations; I did the centerpieces, the banner, and figured out the games and prizes. We were able to use Mrs. J's church's reception room for free, which was nice, because we needed a BIG space - lots of people love the J's!

So the biggest problem was figuring out shower games for a non-traditional shower. I wanted it to center around welcoming the J's into parenting, and not so much around baby stuff because it doesn't relate to their journey. Brainstorming with my friend V, we came up with some modified versions of baby shower games.

• The first game was a silly brain-teaser; it has clues that relate to different names of candy! The people who got the most answers correct got bags of candies that were in the game as their prize. Guests really seemed to like this game, it was challenging but not frustrating!
• Another game we played was a modified baby shower game called "Guess the Price" - except instead of baby items, I picked parenting "essentials" like chewable vitamins, shampoo, swimming wings (or "floaties" as I grew up calling them), etc. This game was a lot harder than the baby version, apparently; the highest score was one person got 2 out of the 6 right. :/ I would modify it by offering multiple choice options, maybe, or picking different items.
• Finally, we played a variation on "baby bingo", but I called it "The Joys of Parenting Bingo". I came up with a bunch of different parenting scenarios (good and bad), and called them out like bingo numbers! I asked the winners if they had any funny stories to share from their Bingo line, too; no one had any, except for Mrs. J's mom! THAT was funny, hahaha.

Speaking of the joys of parenting, we had a "wish vase" for guests to provide words of wisdom and encouragement to the new parents-to-be!

I'm proud of the prizes I came up with, too - "movie night in" baskets and a stationary basket! The stationary came from the Michael's dollar bins, and the "movie night in" are simply movie-theater-size boxes of candy, microwave popcorn, and some Redbox codes for free (to the victor) rentals!  

The "gift card" for the Redbox codes - I included all the legal info that was emailed to me when I bought the codes on the back, so those who won them knew what to do and had the links to more info.

R came up with a great idea for the centerpieces - kids toys! This way not only are they cute centerpieces but HEY MORE TOYS FOR THE J'S FUTURE FOSTER KIDS! Unfortunately, R is a real grown-up with a year-round job, so since I had the time I did the execution. I decided to theme each of them, and wrap them in gift-wrap ribbons and bows so they look like presents but are also totally obvious as to what they are. We had kid books, bubbles, water/beach toys, puzzles, games, art supplies (like coloring books and markers), and a teddy bear! The ribbons tied the gifts back to the color scheme.

1 example of the centerpieces - art supplies!

All the centerpieces! Art supplies, books, games, puzzles, bubbles, pool/beach stuff, and a teddy bear!

Finally, I made this pennant banner. AND I WILL NEVER DO IT AGAIN OMG. Yes, it turned out cute, but those rosettes behind the letters were the bane of my existence. Seriously, it will either have to be for The Hubs or our own future progeny to convince me to put myself through that again. I mean, the end product was cute, but SHEESH.

Yup, I made that. Next time I'm making it a month in advance or just paying someone else to do it.

Detail close-up!

We kept the food simple - cakes from Costco, lemonade, water, and fancy mixed nuts for snacking were on the tables (it was a mid-afternoon shower). Guests also got those pastel mints as party favors.

The basic table set-up

All in all, it was a successful shower and Mrs. J was so grateful - she thanked us (and the guests) repeatedly, and overall seemed to have a great time. The guests also told R and myself that they had a great time, too. All the thanks and compliments made all the stress worth it! (Seriously, if you describe yourself as etierh "a perfectionist" or "anxious", don't plan a party. SERIOUSLY. I'm lucky I'm still married because the night before I damn near went off the deep-end when I realized I screwed up the Bingo cards at 11:30pm.)

I only have my crappy phone pictures right now, but I'm hoping Mrs. J will share the good pictures her photographer friend took! I'll post the better pictures and downloads/instructions for the games next Friday hopefully.

I may have linked up at: 

Six Sisters' Stuff

Hosting a party, the HMHW way

So my husband turned another year older! I co-hosted a party to celebrate his breakin' out of his mom's uterus with another friend/ married couple, as J's bday is 2 days before The Hubs', so they wanted to have a joint bday/poker party.

I talked to J's wife, who is renown for her baking, and she offered to cook the sweets - so naturally, I offered to cook the savory. J then invited his family; not a big deal, except J has a huge family, which means the guest list nearly tripled! I now had to cook for a crowd nearing 30 (when the original guest list was around 10-15), which I've never done before. It also meant I had to change my plan of poker munchies (mainly apps) to something that would feed a crowd a good meal. OY.

Guess what? IT CAN BE DONE. In fact, not only can it be done, but it can be done to the point of overkill!

So first order was to change the menu. Luckily, my heritage has given me an affinity and comfort with Mexican food, and most people won't turn down a taco bar - plus it's easier to make a bunch of food that people can mix and match to their heart's desires than set plates, I figured. Not to mention taco fixings are relatively cheap. Once the bday boys approved, I started looking into how to accomplish this. 

The most helpful link I found was this one, which simplified the formula of how to account for how much to have of everything. I figured I didn't want to be a complete cheap jerk, so the bar consisted of refried beans, seasoned ground beef, and pork carnitas for the "fancy" filling. I also had nacho cheese, shredded cheese, salsa, guacamole, lettuce, and tomatoes for everyone to make their tacos as they saw fit. (Well, I say "tacos", but they were more soft tacos or burritos as the option; we also bought a mess of tortilla chips so people could make nachos if they wished.)

The day of, I made the carnitas in slow cookers (7 lbs. worth! OY). I drove to J's house 5+ hours ahead of the party to get the slow cookers cooking, then ran the rest of my errands and got ready for the party back at my place before heading back there 3 hours ahead of the party to get crackin' on the rest of the food. It got a little intense as the party start time grew close, as I was in the home stretch but not quite done with everything yet and started to freak. J's mom, bless her heart, actually stepped in and helped me finish, which I greatly appreciated. I'd say about the time everyone had arrived about 40 minutes into the party, I was done and everything was ready! I was quite proud of myself.

The spread!

Close-up of my toppings set-up: I love that sectioned platter, so classy IMHO

So for all the sturm und drang and stress, it went off fairly seamlessly (externally; internally, I was a basket case that took an hour to calm down OMG I was so stressed in that last hour). The carnitas were a big hit, and most of the guests dug in enthusiastically. I received lots of "it's great!"s from the guests.

Only bad things: 1. I severely underestimated people's love of guacamole and should've made more, and 2. I MADE WAY TOO MUCH FOOD. I figured people would KEEP eating, but everyone had one serving and stopped. We even had leftover carnitas - which everyone claimed was their favorite! Of course, it didn't help that some people ate before they came (?!?), and although most of the guest list showed up, I'd say only 2/3 of the people actually ate.

J and R declined most of the leftovers, of which there were a TON. For the rest of the weekend and the start of the week, The Hubs and I were eating nothing but Mexican food. After 3 days, we still had a TON of food leftover, specifically beans and taco meat, so I made a schnikey-load of burritos to freeze. I made 10 decent-sized burritos! (I used this link as a guideline for how to prep for freezing.) I love Mexican food, but I'm good for another couple weeks on eating anything other than the burritos, which'll be my lunch at work for the next week or two. Thank god I like my own cooking.

All in all, I was REALLY proud of putting this out. It made me confident that I could do a bigger-scale dinner party once we have a place that can accommodate a larger group! (We live in a one-bedroom apt.)

FIESTA Friday! How I threw a 90's-theme party

SO. I threw a 90's party for my girlfriends this past Spring. It was agreed that it was pretty much all-around awesome. I mean, Hollywood celebrities weren't clamoring to get in or anything, but for us "normal" folks, it's a fun thing to do, esp. since those of us in attendance were pre-teens/teens in the 90's, so most of our memories are from that time.

I (of course) did a ton of research before the party - it's in my nature, I'm an English teacher for Pete's sake. I even provided a link to ideas for 90's outfits (of COURSE you have to dress like the 90's!) to help them out. My original costume idea was a blue dress with a stain on the front, but I couldn't find a cheap dress I was willing to ruin in my size, so I had to settle for a cute "Clueless"-type outfit once I found a cute mini-jacket at ROSS. I totally rocked the slip dresses over t-shirts and thigh-highs and Mary Janes in junior high, I can't lie. xD

Decorations are tricky; the 90's is just retro enough to justify a party, but not quite outlandish enough or far-away enough to have readily available decorations. Also, I was trying to do this CHEAP (and I did - most of the money went to the food, which I admittedly went over-budget with. I'm a fat girl, I like food.). So I settled for color pictures of popular 90's stuff, like No Doubt, Green Day, Bill Clinton, Saved By The Bell, etc. I even found an instructional sheet on how to do the Macarena for health! SERIOUSLY! It was awesome. The internet is a wealth of resources. So I printed them out and taped them all around my living room. I also made a MASSIVE 90's playlist, and offered Ring Pops as guest favors (which were technically developed in the 70's, but got a big commercial push in the 90's so we all remember them from our childhood).

The Menu was my crowning accomplishment. Everyone was so excited to see the food, haha. Probably because one of the items was a tray of sushi. ;p (Yes, Sushi was also developed before the 90's, but it surged in popularity in non-major cities in the 90's. I DID MY RESEARCH!)
The Menu:

• Tray of various Sushi rolls (from our local Raley's)
• Tray of egg rolls (from our local Raley's - not necessarily 90's, but they're good and filling)
• Bagel Bites (came out in the 90's!)
• Light microwave popcorn with "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" spray (ICBINB came out in the 90's!)
• Peanut Butter M&M's (came out in the 90's!)
• Snackwell's Devils Food cookies (which NO ONE ate, but it DID come out in the 90's!)
• Snapple Kiwi Strawberry (who DIDN'T drink that crap in the 90's?)
• Various 2-Liters of soda
• A Pitcher of Cosmopolitans ("Sex and the City" debuted in the late 90's, and they don't sell Zima anymore in the US, so it was a bit of a stretch to use the infamous Cosmos from SATC but it still counts.)

Activities during the party was a movie quote game I made, with a prize of a Titanic coffee table book (found at Goodwill), a slap bracelet, a pack of scrunchies, and 2 bottles of Hard Candy nail polish (which was totally popular in the 90's - they now sell them at WalMart!). We hung out, ate, and talked, and we also watched the movie "Clueless", which is MY favorite 90's movie, and since it was a girls-only party, we were all excited to watch it.

All in all, it was a great excuse to party and we had a blast! I love planning parties, and I was really proud of how this one turned out. Also: Our costumes were awesome! I blurred faces out of courtesy, sorry for how weird it looks, but gotta respect privacy.

It's creepy, ain't it?

An example of my "awesome" decorations