the wedding post. part one.

alright, friends. I survived the wedding madness (although I'm still equally overwhelmed by school at the moment), and now I'm ready to share my insanity with you in a couple installments.

I have so many pictures to show you that I don't even know where to start. Which is kind of how I felt about this project:



Yep, folks, those are mini pies. I had this terrible awesome idea back in August. Come October, I was beginning to think I needed to be committed for even considering baking 120 homemade pies.



Certifiable, alright. Although we used store-bought fillings (except for the Pumpkins)...



...I made the dough from scratch. FORTY BATCHES. Let me say that one more time. FORTY. Want the recipe? I've got it memorized (see below).



Ridiculous. And ridiculously delicious.



this picture isn't about us. It's about the pies. Look at all of those beautiful pies. And, since we're talking about desserts, I may as well talk cake. mmm, cake.





I made a similar cake for Mrs. Jessica Fuchs' bridal shower back in June, and loved it so much that I decided to whip up a taller one for our wedding day! This cake is super duper simple (believe me, if I can make this, anyone can). Find the tutorial here. If I were to make this cake again, I would add more of the heavy cream to my icing (it seemed to crack a little as I piped in on the sides).

A side note about the frosting: It is basically powdered sugar and shortening. Uck. I hate super sweet frosting (I'm partial to the kind that tastes more like cool whip), but boy did it look pretty. The upside: It hardened and kept the cake inside suuuuper moist and delicious. For that, I can eat around the nasty frosting.



I just have to throw in a closeup of our cake topper. love. love. love. could look at it all day.

Our desserts sat on three tables in a "U" shape, with a banner in front that looked a little like this...



This banner was another one of my favorite parts of the wedding. Who am I kidding, it was all my favorite.

So now that I've made you hungry for pie (a dessert that I never want to look at again), I hope you have a wonderful evening! Next up, The Favor Disaster Gone Right.

Flaky Pie Crust:

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup shortening, chilled
3 tablespoons ice water

Whisk the flour and salt together in a medium size bowl. With a pastry blender, cut in the cold shortening until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Drizzle the ice water over flour. Toss mixture with a fork to moisten, adding more water a few drops at a time until the dough comes together. Gently gather dough particles together into a ball. Wrap in plastic wrap, and chill for at least 30 minutes before rolling (I made mine the night before). Roll out dough, and put in a pie plate (or 120 mini pie pans). Fill with desired filling. Then cut tedious mini strips and create lattice work on top of every. single. pie. have fun with that. :)

I've been so excited to try this project for a while now. I found the idea here and couldn't wait to put my own twist on it.

When we were at Hobby Lobby this weekend we picked up a large (I guesstimated the size I thought would look nice in our bedroom...) canvas at 40% off. I also bought some chipboard letters and numbers of various sizes and fonts. I spent a little quality time with the hot glue gun...



Then I asked the Dear Fiancé to hit it with a few coats of white spray paint. If you know me at all, you know it's a good thing that I leave the spray painting to the mister. A few coats turned into five or six...but it was worth it!



here's what we ended up with :) I added some lyrics from our first dance song (spoiler, sorry!), and our wedding date. I just couldn't wait until after the wedding to put it on the wall, though!

Side Note: I picked up two sets of 26 chipboard letters thinking it would be enough for this project. It, my friends, was not. We even drove back across town to pick up another pack of letters, but I had bought the last two that day. Ugh! I was not patient enough to wait the two weeks for another box to come in, so I crafted a "y" out of a "v" and part of a "c"... can you tell which one it is?



Let's talk about this pillow for a second. I'm just in love.

I wish I could say that I made it, but I actually picked it up when it was on sale at Pier One. I don't think it's the mister's favorite pillow, as it usually ends up being a prop for one of his dirty jokes. Boys.



I forgot to pick up anything to hang the canvas with, but I found some picture hanging strips in my "toolbox" that worked just fine (it's still on the wall, at least). Hope you give this easy project a try!

is it fall yet?

Two blog posts in one weekend?! Please don't expect this to happen ever again :)

I must have been bitten by the Autumn bug because for the past week I've been burning my pumpkin pie candle, listening to Christmas music (I'm embarrassed to admit how early I start doing this...), and thinking about decorating the house for fall.

I have two projects to share with you today. I saw both of them online, but I forgot to bookmark them :( If you find links to the originals, please post them in the comments!

Anyway, on to the first project.



I picked up a couple of plastic pumpkins at Target yesterday (for about $5 a piece). Don't worry about that ugly orange spot. I took care of it.






Then, I used a pen to draw some swirlies all around the pumpkin. Add a little bit of hot glue and a lot of glitter, and I ended up with...



Glittery pumpkins :) They're on our "bar" in this picture but I hate cluttered counters, so I moved them to the floor by our TV stand.

Here's my second fall project... candy corn decorations!



I picked up a couple styrofoam cones in the floral section, some cream colored buttons, and yarn (in orange, yellow, and white)



And then I got to work wrapping! This was so easy... it took maybe fifteen minutes to finish both cones.



They fit nicely next to my TV stand arrangement :)



Yes, I was watching Cops. And yes, that is cocaine on that guy's face.

That's all for now... now I have to go clean up after myself. You know how they say that glitter is the herpes of the crafting world? They weren't lyin'. It's all over the house. And in my hair. And on all of the animals.

lazy saturday crafting

After a loooong (I'm telling' ya, it was long) Friday full of lesson planning, I was itching for some quality time with my hot glue gun. I dragged the Dear Fiance to the Hob Lob (actually, he was more than willing, because he also had a project in mind) and picked up the supplies for a few crafty things.

I showed this link to the mister, and he loved the idea.



So we picked up two of these baskets and went to work. It was NOT as easy to mount these puppies as we anticipated. I would have taken pictures of the process but we were both about to throw the baskets across the room. And pull our hair out. And kick ourselves for even thinking about trying this. After about an hour of struggling, we ended up with...



...this. We're pretty darn obsessed with our animals, I'd say.



Noodles took to it right away :)



Sprinkles was not as sure... We'll see if it grows on her.



After that ordeal, I was ready to be done with projects for the day, but I pushed through and started on a wreath for our front door. I'd been thinking about making a non-seasonal wreath for a while now, but am just now getting around to it. This one will more than likely be replaced by a Autumn themed one soon... but it was a quick and easy project, so I don't mind :)



I painted both our building and apartment number, but I decided to only use the apartment number on the final product.



On the front door :) Please ignore the hideous paint scratch on the door. It was definitely there before we moved in...



Come back tomorrow for more crafty things... I've got some Fall home decor ideas :)

if you think i'm crafty...

...then you haven't met my friends.

Here's a little taste of all of the crafty things I received at my bridal shower today. I'll give you three guesses as to the theme :)



My wonderful bridesmaid Brittany made this cute little pencil vase!




And this AMAZING crayon wreath. I simply cannot wait to hang it on my classroom door...which is why it quickly found a home in our office :)



How stinkin' cute is this?! I just can't get over it. Thank you Mrs. Fuchs!



I just love this. My maid of honor is cooler than yours.



Do you see all of this craftiness going on? It's blowing my mind right now! A big thank you to Megan Oh for this awesome frame for my classroom!



PUPPET TREE. I LOVE. That's all I have to say about that. Thank you sweet family!



Had to share this cute little book with my teacher friends. If you haven't read it, buy it. It's adorable. Maegan, you're the best.



Here's a sneak preview. Hilarious.



At the shower, each guest filled out a piece of paper with a date night idea for me and the Dear Fiancé, then I read them aloud. My favorite? "Buy a map of Kansas, throw a dart at it, then drive to wherever it lands and explore for a day." How cute is that?! (Thanks K-dawg). The funniest one? "Nothing beats a trip to McDonalds." My grandma sure is romantic :)

Side note: I managed to drop this jar on my head tonight . You don't want to know.



And last, but definitely not least, are the favors! I love these little magnets made of birch flowers and lace (stay tuned: you will see more of these at the wedding!).



After some lesson planning, the fiancé and I wrapped up the evening with a Friends marathon and some snugs.





It's a pretty lazy night around the Hambley-Gardner household :)

okay okay.

I know it has been an eternity since my last post. And for that I'm sorry. So this post is for those who have been HARASSING me for weeks to post again. Here. you. go. So what has been consuming my life for the past month and a half?



Well, I spend 23 of the 24 hours in a day staring at this beauty, which could be one reason I haven't blogged lately...



OR it could be the fact that we're getting married in 41 days. Remember that pretty desk we remodeled? Yep, it's become a catch-all for all things wedding.



Planning a wedding in 8 weeks has brought out my creative side. And the crazy one too, obviously.



And I can't forget this handsome devil. He was gone for 2ish weeks at the beginning of the month, so we've spent the last couple of weekends laying around doing absolutely nothing. Wonderful. But not productive at all.

DESPITE all of these goings-on, I have managed to get a couple tiny fun projects done.

First, I saw this idea on the amazing Miss Brittany's blog, and I just had to steal it! The Dear Fiancé and I have a mason jar that we've been tossing all of our spare change in, so I thought...

...why not use the change to pay for some of the things on our bucket list?! Here's what we came up with:









We included "Get married" on our bucket list just to be cheeky. Too bad the change in this jar won't pay for the wedding ;)

Thanks again to my lovely bridesmaid for the idea :)

So we're just finally getting all the way settled into the new place (that we moved into in... JULY....ridiculous). My parents were nice enough to donate a TV to the Mitch-and-Sarah-are-poor fund, along with the bracket to wall-mount it!


Well, it has been mounted since July 1st (it was a high priority item for Dear Fiancé, imagine that), but those yucky cords just were not cutting it for me. And, yes, I am watching Elf in September. I just couldn't wait any longer. Those of you who know me know that it's amazing I made it this long.

I ran to Hobby Lobby and picked up a basket, floral foam, and some silk flowers/branches/wheat (50% off, baby!), and came up with this:



Note: I announced to Dear Fiancé that I was putting Elf in the DVD player and he responded, "Fine, but I'm not watching it." Alright. Okay. LIES.



And this is where I'll leave you for now. Happy? Hope so.