as Jules is going - Page 118 of 154 - make disciples of all nations

Knight and Shining Armor 1st Birthday Party {DECORATIONS}

February 9, 2012 by Jules Leave a Comment

My HUBS MASTERPIECE: THE ROYAL CASTE

Our playroom is where I decided to host the main part of the party. Honestly it was because I liked the idea of the read wall as the back drop ;o)

There was the added benefit of the playroom being open to the upstairs hallway with the decorative banner that could easily be made to look like a castle for the festivities. I printed that same dragon on some yellow scrapbook paper and hot glued them to dowel rods and hot glued those to stand on the ball parts of the banister. Then I measured and cut streamers to be taped from the banister down to the top part of the fan.

We had a few balloons left from an arch my dad made over a doorway so we added those to the fan as well {great detour from kids wanting to turn on the fan and chop down the streamers}.

Mommies MASTERPIECE:
The armor and shield/crest

I hunted a plan gray sweatshirt {which my mom found on sale} and then realized I already had a hooded one in the closet- even better!
I cut the blue vest piece the length of the hoody and then cut a hole for the hood to come through {could have been larger to make taking it on and off easier} and stitched on the yellow fabric that I'd printed and ironed on the matching dragon found several other places in the party.

Nanna's Masterpiece:
The "Bean-O"

Happy Birthday, Knight and Shinning Armor Benjamin Ryan!!!

Filed Under: The ones about the Rothacher Home

(in)RL

February 8, 2012 by Jules Leave a Comment

(in)RL

Yup, we're bringing the beach house to you with the goal of connecting women beyond the blog post! How? Well, with a day of (in)courage meetups - think mini beach house parties - all around the country and globe and a webcast for everyone to tune into. A local meetup on a global scale; friends will gather to watch live webcasts of (in)courage contributors and community, connect with one another, and discover new friendships they didn't know were right around the corner!

There will be something for everyone - walking, talking, laughing, hugging blog content - right in the comfort of your living room. The webcast kicks off on Friday, April 27 and (in)RL beach house parties follow on Saturday, April 28 with more live (in)courage content to tune into together. Just imagine thousands of (in)courage women all over the world getting together in homes, coffee shops, restaurants, or churches - you name it- to connect in real life!

There will be a free T-shirt for everyone who registers, fabulous giveaways, a beach house in a box available for hosts, and the fun of meeting women from our local communities who all read (in)courage - it'll be the online beach house (in)real life! We get giddy excited just imagining it!

No need for packing, suitcase or travel
We’re bringing the beach house to YOU!
Local Meetups On A Global Scale

Friday, April 27, 2012 at 5:00 PM - Saturday, April 28, 2012 at 11:00 PM (ET)

Want to host a meet-up but need some help with how to throw a great party?

Questions? Answers! about (in)RL Conference found HERE!

I am considering hosting. Would you be interested in attending? Leave a comment!

Filed Under: The ones about the Rothacher Home

Link Up

February 8, 2012 by Jules Leave a Comment

I linked up over at theencouraginghome.com

and WomenLivingWell.org!

I linked up over at theencouraginghome.com.

Go check out all the other links!

Filed Under: The Ones about Link-Ups

Knight in Shining Armor 1st Birthday Party {CAKE}

February 8, 2012 by Jules Leave a Comment

Hosting a Knight in Shining Armor 1^st Birthday Party

My husband and I have decided that we won’t be doing huge parties every year for our children. But we will do bigger parties for milestone birthdays. For our oldest daughter’s 1^st birthday we did a “Princess Party over the 4^th of July holiday so all our parents could be in attendance. For our younger daughter we did a “Snow Princess Party” in the middle of January. Since I’m a bit on the OCD side of things when it comes to things like name, photo sessions within the 1^st year, and birthday party consistency among my children I thought it would be only appropriate to do a “Prince Party” for my son’s 1^st birthday. My hubs wasn’t a huge fan of the sissy options out there. We chatted for a while and landed on a “Knight Party”! Sticks with the royalty theme but a bit more masculine!

I’m going to do a series of post since walking you through all the DYI party details got pretty lengthy. Today I’ll tell you about the

CAKE

I love how this cake turned out! I discovered a new thing called ‘sugar sheets’ at Wal-Mart. Since I haven’t’ perfected my cake decorating skills to this kind of level it was a GREAT option! It was about $3-4 a sheet. It only took one sheet to make this cake. I made a simple box of devil’s food chocolate cake in a 11x14 rectangle pan. I had my husband sketch this castle {found on Google images line drawings} with a black edible marker, then I cut out the castle.

After the cake was baked but before frosting I laid this on top and cut the outer shape of the castle out. I also cut out the door. Then I placed plastic wrap under the edges of the cake as to not get frosting on the cake stand/carrier and frosted the sides and top of the cake with chocolate frosting. I let that try and then added a second coat. I took the backing off the sugar sheet and placed it on top of the moist frosting so it would adhere well. I found the dragon on picnic.com, made it red and printed {this same dragon was used several places throughout the party}. I cut triangles and taped them to tooth picks for the flags.

See how it became glossy and looks more like real frosting after adhering!

SMASH CAKE {My MOM MASTERPIECE}:

Filed Under: Baking and Cooking, Parties, The ones about the Rothacher Home Tagged With: 1st birthday, 1st birthday party, birthday cake, castle cake, DIY, knight in shining armor, themed party

Puppet Show

February 7, 2012 by Jules Leave a Comment

Puppet show!

Just to be clear. I am NOT good at stopping 'my' day to play with my kids. I know it is an essential part of being thier mom but it doesn't come natural to me. I feel like I have to accomplish something {in the eyes of the world} to make my days worth something. To give myself the excuse to stay home. So, things like puppet shows are becoming a more frequent thing around our house, but for me, it's not easy to let myself have this kind of fun.

My oldest daughter is kind of frightened by this particular puppet but loves the animal finger puppets her Aunt Meg gave her. We have had several variations of puppet show but the most successful so far was preformed behind our preschool table. I just tipped the table on it’s side, hid behind it with my pile of finger puppets and sang my own version of “brown bear brown bear what do you see” for each animal until we’d gone all the way through the pile. All three children were enthralled for at least 15-20 minutes. The oldest 2 (girls 3.5 and 2) learned the rhythm and began singing with me. We have a left over castle {box} from my son’s 1st birthday party that we’re recently done puppet shows in. My eldest actually did the main portion of the performance all on her own as her little sister and I sat in preschool sized chairs outside the window along with an assortment of ‘babies’ in chairs. Simple fun. Play is something I enjoy but have to remind myself to take part in among my days filled with diaper changes, meal prep, and running up and down the stairs swapping babes out for naps.

Does being a play-at-home mom come easy for you? Here's a fun resource I've found: Play at Home Mom!

Filed Under: Parenting, The ones about the Rothacher Home Tagged With: creative fun, how to, play at home mom, puppet show