Wordless Wednesday

Happy Birthday Little Monkey!

My, how time flies... my baby will turn 6 years old tomorrow! We had a bowling birthday party for him over the weekend and at his request, the theme was 'Yellow Submarine' (oh, how I LOVE him!)

He wanted a Yellow Submarine birthday cake. We looked at many birthday cakes for inspiration and of course he wanted the elaborately carved ones. I can bake a cake, but I'm no Master Pastry Chef by any means! After some conversation and more research I convinced him to stick with a more simple style of cake. I saw a rainbow cake and thought that looked pretty cool and I knew that was something I could do. I'm so happy he agreed to it!

Making the rainbow cake was a fun little adventure. We divided the cake batter into 6 different cups, then colored each one with gel food coloring. This was his job. Then we scooped each color into our prepared pans and sent it off to bake. They turned out just perfect! Once the layers had cooled, I leveled them and stacked them so that the colors from top to bottom were: pink, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple.

Now imagine if we had FLAVORED each color? That would be one fun cake!

Handmade Rubber Stamps

If you've ever ordered from me, you'll recognize the sock monkey stamp. This was the very first one I made for hoffee and a nuffin. This was a few years ago and before I had proper tools. I had an Exacto Knife and a Sanford Artgum eraser so, I went at it. It works (and it's pretty cheap - less than a dollar!) I have many rubber stamps and can't resist peeking in the dollar bins for new ones to add to the collection. (Thank you Joannes and Michaels for that little check-out trap!)

Lately I've had the urge to carve more stamps. It is important to me to send orders out with a personal touch. I don't want somebody to feel that they've received a generic order from a company but rather a gift handmade from the heart. What better way to give a first impression than a hand carved stamped image on their package next to their name?

I've just recently acquired all the proper tools necessary to carve. I am fortunate that my mom is generous and purchased a used set of carving tools for me. I don't know, it may just be me, but I sort of like the used tools next to brand new ones. The set I have was obviously very well used and I like to imagine that some really great things were created from them; like maybe there's some energy in them. (Love and creative energy, yeah... that's it!)

Monkey #2's birthday is next week and we're celebrating with a party this weekend. He wanted his theme to be "Yellow Submarine." Let's face it, we're not going to find ANY party supplies with Yellow Submarine so we're left to, you know, do it ourselves. That's okay! We designed our own submarine stamp that we used for his invitations and envelopes. This will be his to use as a gift from Mommy. Happy Birthday Little Monkey!

The monkeys have discovered the game Cut the Rope by ZeptoLab. Have you heard of it? It's a cute game that requires some skill! There's this little creature named Om Nom that you have to feed candy to. I was missing the boys yesterday while they were at school so I surprised them with their own Om Nom rubber stamp. The photo on the top was the stamp as I had made it before school. It was still a little rough so when we came home I sat back down with it to clean it up a bit. The photo on the bottom is the completed stamp. I need to find some craft wood to mount it to... That's the next step!

Next on my "wish list" of things to carve... well, you'll just have to check back in to see what it is. I can't give away ALL of my secrets! Until then, have a fun and CRAFTY day!