Hot Cocoa Bar: Preparation

On Saturday I'm having a little 'Hot Cocoa Bar' outside in the snow with My Friends! I've been wanting to do this for a while (We had a Tea Party in the summer and it was wonderful) but we're having the weirdest winter in my part of Canada... There just hasn't been much snow at all. I love making things and decorating so I'm very excited and I thought I'd share all of the things I'm doing to make it weird and wonderful.. ;)

First things first is my food shopping list. It's a hot chocolate bar but c'mon this is Canada so it's natural that we need a little Tim's French Vanilla. I'll be buying the K-cups you use for a Keurig, just open them up and dump all the powder into a container.

Obviously décor is a big part of pretty much everything these days! Michaels and Thrift stores are your best friend when it comes to this.

I wanted to keep it vintage but girly! Containers to hold my straws, marshmallows and cinnamon sticks. Some labels and everyone needs some sort of chalky surface for anything they do because Pinterest says so!

I decided to pick up some mugs from Value Village because 1, they're cheap and 2, I didn't want everything to be 'matchy matchy'..

Throw blankets are a staple when you're having a gathering outdoors. I made this blanket ladder out of some trim and quarter round but I think I'm going to put all my blankets into a basket for the Cocoa Bar.

And lastly; Printables!!! These are really simple to make on Picmonkey or you can buy some from Etsy OR you can search for free ones on Pinterest. Which is what I did. I wanted to pull this whole thing off on a very low budget but still have it look nice. Just send them over to Staples to have them printed on nice glossy card stock.

This is my favourite one I came across (other than a few I seen on Etsy) It's free and you can download an 8x10 or an 11x14 HERE

Now all I have to do is put on my apron and get to baking! Well, that and set up my entire back yard to look like a magical picturesque Hot Cocoa Bar...


Have you ever had a Hot Cocoa Bar or a Tea Party? Send me links, I love looking at photos for inspiration!

TUTORIAL: How to get gold lettering on Picmonkey!

First go to Picmonkey.com and hover over design, click which ever size you like. I usually go with 8x10 because it's perfect for making prints.

This only works for white backgrounds so just click apply on Canvas Colour.

Next click on the 'Tt' and choose which font you'd like to use. The chunkier the better the gold will turn out. Click 'Add Text' and write in whatever you like, once you have the text and size you want, click 'Combine Layers' on the top bar.

Now click on the little Butterfly on the side panel and choose 'Your Own' at the top. Upload your gold texture photo (you can find these on google images)

Once you've done that click on 'Blend modes' and choose the 'Add' option. And that's it! just drag it over all of your text and if you want you can alter the colour a little bit by dragging the colour circle along the black under the other colours.
You can combine these layers again if you'd like to add other overlays to decorate your print some more!

I hope this was helpful, this may not be the most practical way of doing this but I find it the easiest/quickest way when you don't have Photoshop!

Growing Out A Pixie Cut!

So one day you're sitting there thinking about how bored you are of your hair and you think why not chop it all off into a trendy little pixie cut? Next thing you know all your hair is gone and you feel wonderful about your new do! and soon reality sets in and you realize hair takes forever to grow back and you start to regret chopping all your hair off! But that's the wonderful thing about hair, it does grow back!

Last January I went all Britney Spears on my head and took a buzzer to it. Not that I didn't enjoy having super short hair but it made me realize just how much I loved having my long hair.

On average hair grows 1/2 a month. So 6 inches a year. Obviously some people have hair that grows a little faster or a little slower. People always say you need to get a trim every 6 weeks to keep your hair growing at a steady rate. That's completely stupid. Cutting off the ends of your hair will not make it grow out of your head faster! That being said, getting trims can help with breakage. Meaning, your hair may seem like it's growing more because it's not breaking off at the ends. (If your hair is naturally brittle and dry then this is something you should probably be doing.)

I'm a person who does not get regular trims because I think they're a waste of time and money, I think if you just take care of your hair chances are you can keep the ends healthy. There are a lot of products out there to keep your nice and healthy. One thing I used during the year to help with my hair was Olive Oil. You've probably heard of this. Heat up a bit of oil and massage it into your scalp and then let it sit for a while before washing it out. I mostly used this because I'm constantly colouring/lightening my hair which is fairly damaging.

Almost everyone when growing out a pixie cut gets to the "Mullet Stage" and is completely repulsed! While I'll agree that mullets aren't always the cutest hairstyle, sometimes you have to tough it out. The reason I believe my hair appears to have grown so much in a year is because I neglected the mullet trims!!! I only cut my mullet twice, and only after I had let it go far too long. The last time I cut my hair was about 7 months into my growth process. In July, I gave myself a mullet trim and decided from there on out I was no long cutting my hair. Now 1 year of growth later, It doesn't look weird at all, it does not resemble a mullet. It grew into what I would call a very generic hair cut.

Have fun with every stage of your growth! I colour my hair every so often because I get bored easily and I wanted to keep myself from deciding a new haircut would change things up!
Also I would encourage you to keep progress of your growth because it might not seem like your hair is growing but when you compare it to photos from 2 months ago you really see how much it's grown.

I Apologize for the terrible quality of these photos. They were all taken with my phone.

January 2014!

January 2014! When I cut My hair the top middle section was still about 2 1/2 inches long.

April 2014!

End of April 2014!

End of April 2014!






End of June 2014!

End of August 2014!

End of August 2014!

On the right is at the end of October 2014!

Early December 2014!

Start of January 2015!

Happy Growing! :)

-Melanie xx.

 

Start of January 2015!

The Zombie Walk!

October!! Yaaaay! I love October because I love gloomy weather, fall leaves and ridiculous Halloween movies. (Especially Halloween Town 1, 2, 3 and 4) And I also love October because that's when The Toronto Zombie Walk is held. This year will be my 5th year attending so I'm pretty much a pro by now... My favourite part is obviously dressing up as a zombie and every year I look to improve upon my skills. 

Year 1. I was a housewife zombie. haha

Year 2. I was a hippie, Sondra was a little girl, Corissa a maid, Lindsey a pirate and Amanda was Bo peep.

Year 3. We went as hospital patients/staff. Amanda not pictured was also a nurse this year as well.

Year 3. I seemed to have misplaced the professional photo we got taken of us.

Year 4. I was an ASBO kid from Misfits, Amanda was a house wife and Corissa was a ballerina.

Year 4. A crappy cellphone picture of my makeup. This was my favourite look so far.

Year 4. During the actual walk, it's always freezing so a warm timmies coffee is essential.

Needless to say I'm pretty excited for this year. Hoping to go real big with my makeup! If you live in or around Toronto you should definitely check it out, it's lot's of fun and everyone always wants to take a photo with you.

 -Melanie.

Amateur Photoshoot!

My shirt and skirt are both from H&M.

Left to Right: Lindsey, Sondra, Amanda, Myself.

On Saturday everyone managed to have time to hangout so we decided we would wander around our hometown and take some photos! I'm pleased with how they turned out. We literally just used my Fujifilm camera, it's not a DSLR but it does the trick and we stuck it on a tripod that I got from a yard sale! A Successful Saturday, indeed.

-Melanie.

Harry Potter Anyone?

This would be my second post in a row about both Etsy and Harry Potter... The last one about buying, this one is about selling. I have a shop on Etsy called Violeteli. I sell things on there because I enjoy making stuff. Pretty simple. Basically, I really really really want to go to England. I'm obsessed with England and have been for pretty much forever. I'm hoping that this year I'll be able to go around Christmas time. So I'm hoping that I can completely fund my little trip with the help of my Etsy shop.

So if you're a fan of Harry Potter or you know someone who is, and you/they are also a fan of wearing sweaters then y'all should definitely check out my shop! I like to knit 'Weasley Sweaters'  if you don't know what that is then you don't watch/read enough Harry Potter.

These are a few of the letters that I've done so far! You can get whatever letter you want in sizes from XS-L. Feel free to use the coupon code: BLOGLAND for %15 off your order! Get em while they're hot!


                                                          -Melanie! :)

Cheap Etsy Buys.

The other day I found one of those Prepaid MasterCards in my room that someone had given Me for my 19th Birthday... Two whole years ago! I went online to check the balance and it only had $8.10 left on it, for the last year and a half MasterCard has been taking a percentage off.
I decided I'd go on Etsy and see what I could get for 8 bucks including shipping. I typed in 'Harry Potter' (because obviously) clicked 'lowest price' and started my search. I Managed to purchase two things and still have a balance of $2.00 left on the card!
The first thing I bought was a bookmark. I don't usually use bookmarks because I think they're a waste of money when you could just use a scrap of paper. But this one in my opinion was too cool to pass up!

Yes. Gryffinclaw. Pottermore tells Me I'm a Ravenclaw, but I sometimes feel like a Gryffindor.

So naturally I must be a Gryffinclaw! I think this is the coolest thing ever. The bookmark costs $1.39 from the Etsy shop CrestCrossed I highly suggest you check them out. They're based in Toronto, which is wonderful for Me because I only live 30 minutes from Toronto.

 

The next thing I purchased was a magnet from a shop called MyThoughtsExactly

A little Diagon Alley magnet. I thought it was adorable. I paid only $1.25 for it!

 

 

All in all I think it was a pretty successful Etsy splurge with an $8.00 budget!

-Melanie