I completely love this.

This is a task chart, or kaper chart, I made for my daughter's Daisy troop. The flower is a version of the official Daisy emblem, with ten petals of different colors representing the Girl Scout law. At the end of each petal is a velcro dot. The petals are cut from card stock and glued onto a foam project board. The girls names are on butterflies cut from craft foam. Each butterfly has a velcro dot on the back so her name can be attached to her job at the beginning of the meeting. Thanks for looking!

Sarah

Thanks guys! I'm an English teacher, so this is a natural theme for me

I carved a Poe-inspired jack-o-lantern last night. I searched Google images to find a template for the raven and then wrote "NEVERMORE" with a marker and cut it out.

Here's a pic with the flash on so you can see the pumpkin better:

The cake is a yellow butter cake (no vegetable oil) with buttercream icing. Yummy

Ponyo is a great movie! It's on DVD now, which she got for her birthday, too. My kids and I all love it.

I made candy-covered pretzels as favors for my friend's baby shower:



I used Wilton pretzel candy molds and Wilton Candy Melts. The instructions say to use a paintbrush for the candy molds, and I have done that successfully before, but these are too small. For these, I used a toothpick to spread the colored candy into the foot, toes, and letter shapes. I let it set for a few seconds, then filled the mold with a contrasting color, put the pretzel on top and covered it with candy, and then let it set in the fridge. Don't rush them. They set really firm and are very solid when you give them time, maybe ten minutes per batch. Also, you should tap the top of the mold several times to bring the air bubbles to the surface or you will have holes in your candy.

They took hours and were really tedious, to be honest, but I thought the result was worth the time, and my friends loved them. They are very tasty, too Wilton makes treat bags especially for the pretzels.

I made my daughter a Ponyo cake for her third birthday.



Rather than piping the design onto the cake, I used Wilton Candy Melts to make candy toppers. I drew a template, put it on a cookie sheet, and put wax paper on top. I melted the candy in the microwave in a quart-sized freezer bag and then snipped the tip to pipe the candy onto the template.



I piped the outline first and then filled it in, using a toothpick to spread the candy to fill in all the holes. The hotter it is, the smoother the candy is, but it will also run and mess up the design. If it is cooler, it will stay put but will dry too quickly and be bumpy (I made the hair bumpy on purpose so it would have some texture). I just played with it until I got a good feel for it and made three Ponyos in case they broke. They are fragile.




Close-up of her sisters, which were easy and did not require a template:



I made the sisters swim up the side of the cake:



In case you don't know Ponyo, here is a link with some pictures. I chose fish Ponyo over girl Ponyo because it was a lot easier!

http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/ponyo/

Thanks--it really is big and holds a ton of toys. We have talked about how they will use it in the future. We thought one of them might want to replace the lid or strip the paint and stain it, but I also thought they might like the chalkboard lid for a long time. I would have loved a big trunk with a chalkboard on top even into college. I have a feeling Dad will be building another box when they eventually have separate rooms!

This is my husband's project. It's the first thing he's built, and he did a great job. It's made of pine plywood with pre-made corners and trim that he added. He stained the box, except for the top of the lid, and sealed it with polyurethane. The lid has no trim and hangs about one inch over the box on three sides. The lid is painted with chalkboard paint, which works great. It's really big and hold a lot of toys but also has a nice big surface for the girls to draw on. I think they will fight over who gets to keep it when they get older!