"MARVEL"-ous Halloween

The summer seemed to speed past our eyes quicker than the speed of light (fading daylight apparently that is). The warm summer days give way to cool autumn nights. As we dig out the blankets, jackets, urgh real shoes, it is time to admit that Fall is upon us. I loathe saying goodbye to flip-flops (well at work anyway). They still adorn my feet for grocery getting. But still my more rational side must admit - It's Fall.

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The few highlights of the Fall are the return of pumpkin infused everything! Muffins, donuts, coffee, even macaroni and cheese, and pancakes now get a little touch of pumpkin. Bring on the yum. And once I begin enjoying the Halloween Captain Crunch, you know it is time to begin thinking about Halloween. Well for normal people. I've been thinking about Halloween since the early summer. Deciding on our costume theme takes priority. Then that leads to our decoration theme. And then that leads to our Halloween theme. And voila the magic begins.
I was a good girl for the neighbors. I decorated just the upstairs hallway at the beginning of October. I didn't go marching in all barrels blazing with festivities. But now that it is time, yep I had fun.

Fete Avec Moi

Fete Avec Moi

The second weekend in October was the perfect spot on the calendar to break out this year's decorations for the front walkway. My husband teases me that if I do this much with just an apartment stoop and walkway, things will probably be quite amazing when we have storage and decoration real estate.  So since we are dressing as characters from The X-men I started planning X-men themed ideas. But then somewhere along the way I remembered wait X-men started as that great MARVEL comic book series that i loved.

So MARVEL lead me to super heroes. Which had me tie blue and yellow (wolverine colors) with masks and capes and then the web searches began. So during the summer the hunt for MARVEL (no I'm specific not DC - so no Superman, no Wonder Woman, no Batman, etc.) kids costumes began. I had this picture in my mind of several costumes hanging on the front step railings. I wanted child sized costumes as I didn't want them to be too scary for neighborhood children.

Walmart has a great selection of children's dress up clothes (wasn't really costume season yet). But if you get creative and explore the Clearance racks, you will be surprised what you can find. I found a Spiderman mask and pant set on sale for $6.00 in the clearance bin. It was missing the shirt but okay. So while visiting a friend in Pennsylvania I found a red shirt. Outfit complete. At the BigLots in CT I found an ironman costume. In Vermont on vacation I found a few more decorations. On a weekend away we visited the PEZ tourist center. Guess what they had? MARVEL Pez dispensers. Of course we had to snap them up for prizes. On the drive home we stopped at a Christmas Tree Store and found an Incredible Hulk costume. Then it was time to wait. Search online. Complete our costumes. Curate ideas for our annual Halloween fun.

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Then finally after sitting on my hands long enough this past weekend it was time to decorate. In my searches I found several adorable pictures of wall art scenes that could be used for photo-ops. My friends seem to really enjoy participating with these when they are visiting. So I just had to recreate something similar as: sample one and sample two for our hallway.

After Halloween of course I will have more to share. But I don't want to ruin all the fun for our guests. Hope you will check back after Halloween to see the additional updates.

Simple Summer Tea

Summer – brings to mind warm days, family gatherings, sun, and fun. The last few weeks have been very busy. Sorry I haven't blogged. There wasn't much time or energy for entertaining. But I need to remind myself entertaining for two is just as important as doing so for a group of friends.

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Recently at our local Christmas Tree Store, I found the greatest glasses. They look like a clear glass slipped inside a Ball Jar with a lid and straw. Perfect for summer days and nights (anti-bug design).

Last year, I remembered you don't need to waste your money on iced tea powder chemical garbage. My mom and her friend, Anita (who growing up always had a pitcher of the most delicious iced tea ready to serve) always made theirs from regular tea bags. They brewed real tea, then let it cool and poured over ice. But during the course of the summer last year, I discovered that you don't actually need to heat the tea. Many companies now make cold brew tea bags. Our local target tonight had 2 boxes of 24 cold brew tea bags on sale for $4.50. I am horrible at math but won't this come down to something like $.10 a pitcher.

Now during this year, I learned about water infusions. Adding cucumbers, lemons, oranges or other fruits and vegetables to your water can alter the flavor. So now I combine both ideas. Into my pitcher I slice a lemon or two or an orange, sweeten lightly (maybe a tablespoon of sugar to the whole thing), hang a tea bag (any flavor – cold brew or hot brew) off the side, fill with water. Refrigerate for a few hours. Remove the tea bag. Yes, I hear my mother's warnings about not letting the tea bags sit for too long or the tanic acid builds up. And for the rest of the day I have a nice pitcher of infused iced tea. You might like to try it too. My favorite blend so far has been an orange sliced with a blueberry acai tea bag. What combination works for you? I'd love to hear what you have come up with.

Lucky in Love

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Another belated update:

One of our colleagues was recently engaged. Yay! We were so excited for her. Our director had the great idea to turn one of our monthly meetings into a breakfast Engagement Party. She asked for a little help with decorating. Thankfully she has a great connection at a deli that provides wonderful fare. It took a little while to devise a theme. Black and silver? Technology... Black and Green? Matrix... Then our director suggested that she could bring red velvet muffins iced with a white icing. Okay red and white it is. Hmm red and white... Red, hearts. Okay, a start. Red and white, hmm. Playing cards. Luck. “Lucky in Love” and “Wishing you Luck”. This led me to the heart suit of the playing card deck. I found a great graphic of a slot machine. I texted our friend who was recently engaged to find out when they became engaged.

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Believe it or not 3 – 31 – 13. Love it. Talk about lucky in love. How cool do those numbers look on a slot machine. Jackpot! She's engaged.

Okay so I started thinkin/researching for ideas for breakfast foods on the theme. I found a great heart shaped cheese board. Bought two. One was wrapped as a gift. One was used for cheese slices.

I vaguely remembered seeing heart shaped cereal. I went online to find it. Yes, it does exist! It is made by Quaker. It is called Whole Hearts. The website claimed that it was sold at one location. Visit the location. No dice. Urgh not so lucky. Thought about it. Let me try the A&P. Believe it or not, they had it. Yay! 2 boxes, add to cart. Grabbed a container of greek yogurt and a container of milk. Picked up strawberries and pineapple chucks. Turned them into skewers which surprisingly were very well received.

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Being a technology department we had to “techify” things. So I had battery operated lights to decorate with. At Party City I found over-sized playing cards, regular decks of cards, dice, poker chips, and playing card dishes and food picks. Together I think it made for a simple but festive breakfast buffet.

Our director joined in the decorating fun by arranging the single serve orange juice containers she brought into the shape of a heart. How clever!

Using a Word template for Avery labels I created a graphic with playing cards that announced her engagement. These labels were then wrapped around chocolate bars. At

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Michael's Arts and Crafts I found boxes of mini-playing cards. These were wrapped with the saying "2 of a kind. A perfect pair." Nothing like easy favors to help everyone remember the day.

Thank goodness for our wonderful, local dollar stores. White and red table cloths, red cups, very pretty filigree red plates, red forks, knives, and spoonsk, etc all finished off the look.

In my party planning explorations, I also found one of those game night sets. This was wrapped in beautiful wrapping paper and a graphic was taped to the top that spoke to “The couple that plays together; stays together”. We are so thrilled for our colleague and wish her and her intended a lifetime of luck and happiness.  

Spring Training

Forgot to share this recent work event. I needed a way to offer colleagues a moment to spend their time with me to learn how to use a new tool at their disposal. What better way to get people to visit then offer light refreshments. So my mind mulled over a few ideas and I believe hit one out of the park with a baseball/Spring Training theme. The only thing I miss are those little snack cakes from Hostess that use to be shaped like baseballs. Problem is the company is no more. Urgh. But here is what I came up with to embrace the theme – Spring Training.

I found a great tablecloth with baseballs at Party City. This covered a filing cabinet which served as our food table. Stop and Shop sells Marshmallow Peanuts. As real peanuts are no longer allowed due to possible allergies this was the way to go. I found a large bag of Double Bubble which was placed in a serving dish I made from green construction paper. It made it look like grass on the field.

Fete Avec Moi - Spring Training

Always remember to explore the clearance area in your party stores. Last year's item will probably serve your needs quite well this year but cost you far less. How about a plastic baseball hat for $1.50? Of course I grabbed two. The website that I wanted to staff to visit was written across the hat as a reminder of where to navigate to on the web.

Stop and Shop also carries these cupcake trays. They are iced in away that looks like one big cake. But they are really individual cupcakes. Clever! Since we were celebrating Spring I chose the ones decorated with butterflies and flowers. They made quite a festive display on the food table. I am also impressed with how long they last. Must have quite a bit of preservative. But they were rather yummy so it is all good.

Creative thinking regarding how to view food from local food stores, Target, and Party City led to a spread that included Cotton Candy, Animal crackers, popcorn (served in a large baseball bowl [$1.89 in the clearance section], brownies with spring sprinkles, Oreos, and butterfly shaped Little Debbie snack cakes. A few baseball themed items (whistles, banks, wiffle ball bat, etc) finished off the decorations. Lunch time professional development sessions with a little fun and flair for a very small budget. Just the way I like it. I hope you like the photos of our festivities.

 

Beef Bourguignon

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So we are trying to eat healthier. Vegetables are never what I gravitate towards. But I know they are what we need to start enjoying to better fuel our bodies. So yesterday, I shopped at our local FairWay. I filled our pantry, freezer, and fridge with more healthy alternatives. So I know my blog usually covers the entertaining we do for friends. But once in awhile it is nice to prepare something special for just us. So this evening's dinner started with a package of Trader Joe's beef bourguignon. This dish can't be beat. 2 servings in a microwave ready tray (6 minutes in microwave). Nice! Now while that microwaved, I made some mushroom pappardelle (2-3 minutes in boiling water) that I had picked up yesterday at Fair Way. I asked the darling husband if he would prefer corn or broccoli with dinner. He opted for corn (4 minute steamer bag). So there lies the crux of the culinary mixture of this evening. In a deep fry pan that I have I sauteed the papparedelle, corn, red onion, pepper chunks, and balsamic vinaigrette. After the beef finished cooking I added that to the fry pan. Sauteed the whole thing for a little bit. Served up by placing some of the pappardelle noodles, then layering the beef, then the corn mixture. I had extra so I made another plate for our neighbor. She just called to tell me how delicious it was and asked how I made the beef bourguignon. I was glad to share my secret Trader Joe's did the hard part. I just added to it.

Trying to embrace vegetables in different ways where I don't notice/hate them. Mushroom Pappardelle was a great way to get more veggies into our dinner. FairWay had a terrific bag of fresh spinach. After washing I served with goat cheese, dried cranberries, and a yogurt Boat House salad dressing. I refuse to eat cardboard. But I need to stop eating such processed horrible food too. So this weekend we began a new phase. Hopefully this phase will be just the next step on our road to a healthier life rather than just a passing fad.  If you are looking for a quick and yummy dinner, may I suggest trying this one night.

Ere Long Leprechaun Luncheon

Today I hosted my Ere Long Leprechaun Lunch. My husband had to work today. So I figured this would be the perfect time to have the girls over for some fun and food. This way tomorrow the husband can relax and enjoy his day off/St. Patrick's Day. Luckily a couple of my friends were free to come celebrate with me.

Guests were greeted first by the rainbow on the stoop railing. This was featured previously on my blog post.

I guess my friends enjoy playing games and having fun too at my parties. I recently had two parties where I didn't go quite as grandiose. Guess my friends noticed and as our apartment steps echo I heard their comments coming up the stairs. I have overheard, "There aren't any decorations downstairs," "I was looking to see if you hid stuff on the steps and outside," and "What no games!"Some would think my friends at our age would be bored/over/vexed by my ideas for games. Apparently not. Yay! I enjoy spending a few hours having fun and acting immature. All work and no play makes Neene a dull lady, right?

So here is a brief recap of today's fun:

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 Food is always a focus. I provided a buffet including:

• crock pot corned beef and cabbage [beer, chicken broth, cinnamon, a sprig of thyme]
• salad [red cabbage and brussel sprouts]
• Golden potato salad [store bought potato and egg salad]
• Greened potatoes [microwaveable mashed potatoes, steamed spinach, cheddar cheese, ranch dressing, and scallions]
• "Pesto" pasta [spinach, agave nectar, olive oil, egg noodles]

Desserts:

I love creative desserts. Since the theme was Leprechauns and pots of gold I found a great lemon bar mix.

Sounded so good in theory. The crust cooked up nice and golden brown. The lemon filling didn't bleeping cook through. Not serving those.

Darn it! So I ran out this morning to Stop and Shop. They had a heart shaped cake that they decorated like a leprechaun face. That will work! Sadly, I didn't think to photograph it before we dissected him.

I had found green sweet things: green blowpop lollipops, green and white starlight mints, green M&Ms, green wrapped rolo chocolates. So martini glasses were filled with each item to display them for the guests to enjoy. I had seen online a very creative blogger that dipped oreos in yellow icing and then rolled them in yellow sprinkles. Very cute pots of gold. This gave me an idea. What if I cut off the top of a chocolate donut 

hole and dipped them in sprinkles. I rushed off mid-week to our local Stop and Shop for supplies. They actually had gold (not yellow but gold) sprinkles. I sliced a donut hole. I dipped it in the sugar crystals. They didn't stick that well. So friday when I went food shopping I scooped up a can of spritzable yellow icing. Now the came out quite adorably. 

Games:

Fun 1: I found an ever so cute leprechaun printable puzzle online.

http://spoonful.com/printables/leapin-leprechaun-puzzle-st-patricks-day). I printed one for each guest. I placed all the pieces from each one into an

envelope. Each friend received an envelope. If they were able to complete the puzzle they earned a prize. The squeals of laughter were well worth it. The prize was a rubiks cube typed toy with St. Patrick's Day themes. Reminiscing about playing with these in the past was a ton of fun.

Fun 2: Have you heard of building a leprechaun trap? This is one tradition that I have never participated in before. But I found this online. How cute! Apparently  people create traps to catch a visiting leprechaun. The attract them with green, gold, and shiny things. So I placed a basket with grass and gold under a box and set the

trap. I tied 1 cauldron (like a little pot of gold) to the trap stand bar. All the rest were simply taped to the bar. I had my friends pull a number out of a hat. Then they each picked up the corresponding numbered cauldron. We all pulled and followed the strings until only one remained tied. This would be our lucky winner. The winner received a gold nugget candy, a leprechaun teddy bear, and a green lunch container.

Everyone received a pot of gold (gold chocolate coins) as a favor.

Now to recap the decorations:

I found a fabulous beer mug shaped stuffed thing. I think it was meant to be a hat. I stuffed it with green roses that I made from a roll of crepe paper. I saw this idea online while looking for St. Valentine's Day ideas.

I found a $.99 plastic green St. Patrick's Day hat. I filled it with 2 single

serve containers of Lucky Charms. And mixed this with a bag of popcorn and green sprinkles. A perfect combo of salt and sweet. Just the right amount of crunch.

Yes, I even decorated the cups. I found shamrock stickers that started it. I placed a sticker on each cup for the coffee. Then I realized hey I could draw shamrocks too. So on the second set I drew shamrocks with a green permanent marker. 

I covered all my tables with blue tablecloths to let the green accessories stand out in contrast. At the Christmas Tree Shop, I found sparkly shamrock cut outs. At ShopRite, I found a small potted clover plant. This rounded out the table decorations.

At this party as my friends came up the stairs I heard, "Oh my goodness would you look at this!" "How does she come up with this stuff?!" and "Oh I hate you how do you do all this". I just loved hearing these comments as I opened my door to guests. Thanks for joing me ladies. Thanks for embracing the fun. Looking forward to the next party. Now to dream up the next party idea.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow... Irish Eyes Are Smiling

So last year, as I celebrated St. Patrick's Day, I dug out the big witches cauldrons that I have for Halloween. I tied one to each side of our front steps. I put gold bows taped along the top to resemble a pot of gold. It was cute, but something was just missing. On about March 15th I realized what it needed...
A Rainbow

Fete Ave Moi

So this year, I planned ahead. I visited a local dollar store. Yes $1 each for plastic rectangle shaped table cloths. R-O-Y-G-B-I-V it's amazing how mneumonic devices really do work.  All these years letter I still remember the colors of a rainbow's light spectrum should range appropriately from red to violet. I also invested in a large pack of black hair ties ($1.99 for about 36). Lastly 2 gold table cloths to fill the pot (along with some Halloween stones for weight) and voila. Eleven dollars later we have an adorable, waterproof rainbow cascading down our steps into a pot of gold. Perfectly fit for any leprechaun.

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We also have another set of steps that sit closer to the road down our hill. Needed a splash of color there. A green garland from the Christmas Tree Shop did just nicely.

Luckily, we have a lovely next door neighbor who looks forward to my decorations. So I get to decorate the landing on our level and our hallway too. I haven't gone all out yet. I have a few more ideas in mind for this weekend. But at least I have started adding a little cheer. I still have the $2.99 lit branches I had purchased around Halloween. Love getting a second use out of something so inexpensive. I placed them inside another cauldron, covered the bases with a navy blanket, and wrapped a green clover garland wire ($.49) around the branches. It looks rather ethereal I think. Especially at night when I can light them. They are powered by batteries. Another green garland wraps along the railing of our hallway stairs. Shamrock cutouts that were purchased in a multi-pack for $1.49 were the finishing touch. A few years ago, I purchased a set of bells covered in white and green ribbon that I just love on our apartment door for St. Patrick's Day. Of course, I dug them out.  A large green pull bow that I had in the closet from earlier gift wrap packages completes the look on the landing. When it comes to seasonal decorations I truly believe in choosing a color scheme and re-purposing items that you already have. Free decorating.

Of course, after all that decorating I had to relax and reward myself with a McDonald's Shamrock Shake and some time on the couch with magazines. This would have been the perfect end to a perfect Saturday. Except... then it snowed. Of course it did! I decorated for Spring. Glad all my decorations were waterproof.