^..^Pin-Up Kitten^..^: 2011

The BEST Homemade Sugar Body Scrub

I have always been a huge fan of body scrubs, whether they be sugar or salt. I always love a good exfoliant!! I've been a fan of LUSH body scrubs and I've used many different other types over the years as well.

Well, with the help of Pinterest, I found a peppermint sugar body scrub recipe of which I tweaked and made my own. I didn't want to write about it until I had perfected it, and used it and got the results I wanted. I've been playing with the recipe for about 2 weeks now and I have to say that it's AMAZE-BALLS. I love it soooo much! I will never spend $$$ on high priced body scrubs ever again.

Being the generous person I am ;), I decided to share my recipe. I have bottled it up and am going to give it out to some friends for Christmas! I know that I would LOVE to receive a peppermint sugar body scrub during the holidays!! And the whole process is actually really easy!

Using this recipe, I was able to scoop all of it into about 4, 4-5oz jars. So it makes about 16-20 oz worth of scrub. :)

What you need:

Medium sized mixing bowl and spoon

3 cups of white granulated sugar

1 cup of *Sunflower Oil

15 drops of peppermint **essential oil. You can substitute the peppermint for lavender, eucalyptus, mandarin, vanilla, etc. I used peppermint because I feel it ties in well with the holidays.

Optional: Vitamin e squeezed from capsules. I took about 5 vitamin e capsules and pierced the end with a safety pin and squeezed the oil into the bowl. Just to give it that extra bit of nourishment for your skin.

Get started!

Combine your sugar and oil in a bowl and stir it up well, until there are no clumps. Then add your essential oil, stir again. Scoop into jars! For myself, I put some in a tupperware bowl. Voila!! Easy peasy!

*Using sunflower oil is an important step. I tried this recipe with olive oil and it did not come out as well. Plus the smell of the olive oil overtakes the peppermint, and not in a good way. I get the sunflower oil at a health food store. It runs about $13 for a 32 fl oz jar. I also love that it's organic! **I also get the essential oils at the health food store too. They run about $6-8 for a little jar, but they last a long time.

I have used this in the shower a few times now and it's amazing. The peppermint smells soooo good and it's the perfect amount of sugar/oil ratio. Your skin feels amazing and soft afterwards. I don't even need to use lotion when I get out of the shower like I usually do, and that says a lot coming from a girl that lives in the hot, dry desert! I have also used this on my face and have not had any breakouts. I can't say that will be the same for everyone, but for me it was no problem and my face is soft and smooth and refreshed!

To give as gifts:

The jars were purchased at Ikea, but you can get jars anywhere these days. Just the other day I got some bigger ones at The Dollar Tree. The little spatulas I got at Sally's Beauty Supply (I'm sure most beauty stores have them), and I made the tags on my computer. I tied the tag and spatula on the jar with a peppermint candy striped ribbon.

Sorry I have a crummy camera... I need to invest in a nice one soon. :)

Cupcake Post

I made these turkey themed cupcakes last Thanksgiving and they were such a big hit, so I'm going to make them again this Thanksgiving! :)

They are VERY easy to make. I use milk chocolate icing and chocolate cake. For the face and wings I use the small Sandies that come in the 100 calorie packs, candy corn for the feathers, white icing with a black dot of icing for the eye, a small piece of rolled up fruit roll up for the waddle, and the white part of the candy corn for the nose. Just a note, don't stick the Sandies on until you're close to ready to serving them, otherwise they get really soggy. :)

Holiday Themed Hairbows!

I just wanted to post a link and some pics of the holiday themed hairbows I've been making lately. :)

True Blood Costumes

One of the (many) Halloween costumes I did this year was Sookie Stackhouse from True Blood (LOVE LOVE that show): I made the t-shirt:

I bought the apron and bottle of TruBlood:

Just for added effect I put on tattoo vampire bites :)

At the last minute Nathan decided to go as Bill:

Cupcake Post

Here's another cupcake post for the spiderweb cupcakes I made for a friend's Halloween party! I <3 cupcakes!!

Cupcake Post

I just thought I'd share a quick pic of the cupcakes I made for my Fright Night Halloween party. I really liked the way they turned out!

I used chocolate cake, buttercream icing dyed green, milano cookies for the tombstones, black writing gel, and crushed oreos for the dirt. The hardest part was the grass technique, but once I got it down it was smooth sailing. :)

Halloween Hair Bows

I just wanted to post a few of the Halloween style hair bows I've made recently for little girls. I love making these in my free time, it's such a fun hobby! :) http://www.facebook.com/pinupkittenboutique

I can't believe the summer is over! But then again, I can. We had SUCH a busy summer! There were a few birthdays (my twinkies turned 2!), and we traveled to San Diego, Las Vegas, and Indiana. My sister-in-law got married and I was the Matron of Honor. That was a lot of work, more than I realized!! It was fun though. In a way I'm glad the summer is over because now I can focus on school. And fall also means HALLOWEEN is coming!!!! My ultimate FAV holiday!

Oh, by the way I went back to school! I took a lot of nursing and business classes back in 1998-2001. Then I moved around, got married, moved some more, and then had twins. Finally I feel like I'm settled down a bit. I want to finish what I started and finally get my darn degree. It will be in Integrated Studies. I only have 7 electives to take, and I'm taking 2 of those right now. So far I really like my classes. I especially like going to class twice a week. It's a much needed break, and it gives the grandma's some alone time with their grandkids!

The next couple of months are going to be busy also. This month I'm taking the kids to the State Fair, which is normally not my cup of tea. When I was younger I had no fear of those old, rusty, thrown together in 5 minutes, rides. Holly, remember the rides at the fair?! LOL!! Good times! We rode like 30 rides in one hour and Holly got super sick!

Next month we'll be going to the Balloon Fiesta. I went last year and it was great. This year I think the kids will be really into it...Lyla especially because she loves balloons. Then there's haunted houses, my Halloween party, a friend's Halloween party, and then finally HALLOWEEN!!!! I think on the actual day we'll be taking the kids to Calvary church. Last year they had this huge fall festival thing with food, jumping castles, pony rides, candy, and all kinds of other stuff. The kids loved it, and Nathan and I had a great time too.

Anyway, that's all for now... I just wanted to give a short update.

Any blog posts requests? I was thinking I'd do one about my skin care regime since I've seen a few of those on here lately. Hope everyone is well!!

PS~ Do you like the new blogger layout? I kind of like it!

SDCC 2011

Sorry for the lack of posting! I guess I just haven't had much to write about!

So Nathan and I are getting ready to head off to San Diego for Comic-Con next week! A little background on this...

Nathan is a HUGE Marvel fanatic. He's always collected comic books and loved everything about the comic industry. He started working for Marvel's wikia database part-time and he also does comic book reviews online every week. (Aside from working full time as a nuclear physicist. The guy is BUSY.)

When I lived in San Diego, I always thought going to CC would be fun, but I was never able to get tickets. Granted, I didn't try very hard. There's 100,000 people that go every year, so it's insane.

So, this year Nathan is working with his Marvel database people at CC and I decided I'd go as well. We're going to leave the twins here with my parents for a few days, and then my sister-in-law is going to take them during the weekend, and them my mother-in-law will have them until we get back. We'll be gone for a week!

I'm sooooo excited! I've always been a HUGE fan of dressing up in costume, whether in vintage clothes, or costumes for Halloween. If there's somewhere to be that requires a costume, I'm SO there. I've always loved it ever since I was little.

So when I realized the sheer amount of costuming (or cosplay as the CC goers call it) I was all up on it! LOL... All I cared about was who is a sexy comic book girl that I can dress as. So... Emma Frost it is! There are going to be 1.5 million Emma Frost's there, but that's OK. I'd rather do someone I like than be stuck with something I'm not a fan of. The nice thing about cosplay at CC is you can basically dress as whatever you want. Characters from TV, movies, comic books, whatever you can think of. I also have a cute Star Trek dress with go-go boots that I plan on wearing.

Nathan is going as Mimic and he's been working like crazy on his costume. It's going to be awesome when it's done. Luckily for me I was able to buy my costume online (which apparently some cosplayers say is a big no-no because you're "supposed" to make it from scratch. But whatever I don't care.)

Aside from costuming I get to see some of my favorite TV and movie characters!! The panels I'm going to attend are; The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn panel, True Blood, The Vampire Diaries, and The Big Bang Theory. Just to name a few!! I'm going to be so star struck! Ian Somerhalder, I'm coming for you! LOL
The Twilight panel is going to be total insanity. It's Thursday morning, but people will be camping out all night Wednesday! Not sure if I'm that hardcore about it. I guess we'll see!

I'm really excited to go, but soooo nervous about leaving my babies behind. I will miss them SO much! I've only spent one night away from them and that was hard enough! I have no doubt that they'll be in good hands, but it'll still be hard!

Bunny Cupcakes

Just a quick post to show my bunny cupcakes that I made for Easter.

I love the way they turned out!!

Butterfly Hair Clips

I love the Dollar Tree! I always find the cutest stuff there.

Most of you know that I make little girls hair bows and flowers as a hobby. Well, when I saw these packets of sheer butterflies at the Dollar Tree, the first thing I thought was what a cute hair clip that would make! Especially for Easter!

This project is super easy. All you need is: Hot glue gun, wire cutters, hair clips or bobby pin, ruler, hair ribbon (if you want the clip lined), and a lighter.

The first thing I did was use my wire cutters (purchased from Hobby Lobby) to cut off the wire on the back of the butterfly. I started with one of the big butterflies.

For the bigger butterflies, I used a larger alligator clip. Since the butterfly is accented with silver, I don't think you necessarily have to line the silver hair clip, but if you want a more finished look, then go ahead and line it.

So after I cut off the wire on the back of the butterfly, I set it to the side and get an alligator clip. To line the clip, I cut 4.25" ribbon (3/8"). Once your ribbon is cut, heat seal both ends, put hot glue on the tip, slide the clip on, put glue the rest of the ribbon, and wrap the ribbon around the clip. I like to partially line my clips because it stays on better in my opinion.

After I have the clip ready, I hold it to the back of the butterfly to decide how exactly I want it placed. For the lined clip, I slanted it slightly to the way I usually put clips in my daughter's hair. Once I found the placement I liked, I put hot glue in the center of the back of the butterfly and held to clip to it for about 5-10 seconds. Make sure the flat part of the clip is facing out so that it's the part that lays against the head.

Voila!! An adorable butterfly hair clip! This is the bigger one. The smaller one also looks super cute.

I also made one using just a craft bobby pin:

Add glue, apply pressure and hold for about 5-10 seconds.

Lastly, I put a smaller one on a french barrette: