BFF Open House Link Party #126

Happy Friday Eve! Hope everyone has had a good week so far. Did you recover from last week's chocolate features? The party was a fun one thanks to all of you! Here are a few inspiring ideas that caught my eye:

I'm sure a Psychologist would have lots to say about my lifelong fascination with seeing images in blobby things like clouds. This DIY inkblot art by Creative Blossoming  definitely caught my eye. What a fun and fresh decor idea. Plus there's no right or wrong either in what you make or what you see! 

These luminaries by the Crafty Lumberjacks are just the right combination of whimsy and spooky don't you think? 

Steph from the The Silly Pearl is as "punny" as I am and has some great Halloween themed printables to share. 

I'm late to the mason jar trend but the ladies from Made From Pinterest have a must try idea. A wreath made from mason lid jars and washi tape! 

This week's chocolate feature is from The Sweet Tooth Life. Double fudge  peanut butter cookies with homemade peanut butter chips! 

So...whatcha been up to this week?  As always, thanks for making The Answer Is Chocolate a part of your week! 

Breast Cancer Awareness Month: Winged Hearts Hammered Metal Necklace Giveaway

Being a member of the Blue Moon Beads design team , I am always excited when I receive supplies to play with. The timing was perfect on my most recent goodies which included some pink stone beads. I knew immediately that I wanted to make something in recognition of “Pinktober” being Breast Cancer Awareness month.

I don’t know anyone whose life hasn’t been touched in some way by this disease. Whether as a survivor, family member of a survivor, friend, colleague, neighbor, I really cannot think of anyone I know who hasn’t known someone. This month marks four years since we lost one of our closest friends to this disease and we miss her every day.

I did what I always do with a jewelry project. Laid out a bunch of things I might use and just kind of went from there. I knew for sure that in addition to the pink stone beads and silver chain, I wanted to use the gold and silver hammered metal connectors. All supplies used in this project are from Blue Moon Beads and were provided to me as part of the design team.  Project idea is mine.

They went perfectly with a gold and silvered “Winged Heart” pendant from my Blue Moon stash.

I laid out sections of the chain and metal connectors and then wire wrapped some of the pink beads using gold bead caps and silver spacer beads.

Connected those to the lengths of chain using silver jump rings, and added some to the pendant as shown above, along with a rectangular rhinestone pendant and some lengths of chain.

The clasp is really two oversize lobster claw heart clasps. I wanted to tie the idea of hearts and wings together to match the pendant. We think of our friend soaring above us, and we carry her in our hearts.

Our sweet friend was one of the most giving people we’ve ever known. So I thought it would be appropriate to give away this necklace in her memory. It just seems right. Here’s how to enter:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Giveaway will run through next Wednesday and the winner announced at next week's BFF Open House. 

Winner: Oriental Trading Company Gift Card

Thanks to everyone who entered to win the $25 gift card giveaway to Oriental Trading Company that I hosted last week. The Rafflecopter thingy-ma-widget has chosen the winner and she is:

Congrats Lauren! I've emailed you so as soon as I hear back, I'll get your GC on its way. Happy shopping! 

Batty-Licious Halloween Earrings

Just a reminder that today is the last day to enter to win my giveaway from Oriental Trading Company. Go here to enter.

I posted last week about some of the items I received from the. Included were some soldered Halloween themed charms. Disclosure: This is a Sponsored Post by Oriental Trading Company. Project Idea and opinions are my own. 

They have an image on one side and text on the other. I thought they’d make fun earrings to wear throughout October. The earrings are  big and bold but not as heavy as they look.

I grabbed some findings and beads from my stash and played around, stringing a fire polished black crystal bead, some metal spacer beads, and the soldered charms on beading wire. Attached to a square pendant piece and adhered a clip earring back with jewelry glue.

People may think I’m batty, but I’m loving my batty-licious earrings!

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BFF Open House Link Party #125: Chocoholics Unite Edition

Happy First Friday in October! Our weather here in the PNW is a little confused and it's been more like late November with torrential rain and windstorms. Hopefully, not a sign of things to come. Given that I have a blog with chocolate in the title, I thought I'd focus on chocolate this week so all of this week's features are, you guessed it: CHOCOLATE!  Get your pin finger ready. 

So last week I featured truffles by Karyn from The Dieter's Downfall. They were dangerous enough on their own but not content to make us drool over just the truffles, she went and put them on a cake. ON A CAKE! 

Then, along came these Oreo coconut cheesecake bars from Mary Frances at The Sweet-Tooth Life. Chocolate and coconut oh my and yes please!

True confession time. I don't love pumpkin. There I said it. How College Boy ended up in love with Pumpkin Spice Lattes is beyond me. BUT, these Pumpkin Spice Fudge Brownies from Stephanie at Back for Seconds, may just win me over. 

Fall is the perfect time for oatmeal raisin cookies. But these Oatmeal Raisinett cookies from Life With the Crust Cut Off, bring them to another delicious level.  I have a thing for Raisinetts so there might not be any left for the cookies. 

Finally, you know how your family will want hot cocoa and you may or may not feel like making it from scratch and you may or may not have some packets of mix leftover from last year because it hasn't been hot cocoa season yet this year and you haven't bought any and oh...go make this now to have it on hand! You can thank The Pin Junkie

Still with me or are you in a chocolate sugar induced coma? On to this week's party. 

Bewitchingly Vintage Witch Hats and A Giveway From Oriental Trading Company!

I continue to be drawn to more muted and vintage Halloween décor. I mentioned earlier that I was planning on switching up my mantle this year from Poe inspired to Shakespeare. It was the Three Witches from Macbeth that inspired this project.

It was perfect timing when the folks from Oriental Trading Company gave me the opportunity to review and play with some of their Halloween crafting goodies. This post is sponsored by Oriental Trading Company. Project idea and opinions are mine.

If you're not familiar with Oriental Trading Company or haven't been there in a while, in addition to a great selection of party supplies and project kids that are great for kids, they have really really expanded their crafting supply section. I was able to go through the ordering process which was straightforward and easy, and my shipment arrived quickly.

The hats themselves are not actually hats. They started out as these:

Plain paper mache cones. I covered them using torn and twisted kraft colored butcher paper and Mod Podge  and glued them to a cardboard circle base.

Since I knew I wanted them to be old looking, I wasn’t precise and just kind of went over the form until it looked like a witch’s hat. When dry, painted with black paint. Now for the fun stuff!

I chose some of the Halloween papers from Oriental Trading Company along with epoxy poison labels. I used the papers to make layered flowers that I scrunched and crumbled. After all, the witches from Macbeth would not be seen in pristine new hats.

Using some of the die cuts and stickers I also received, I made accessories for my hats, keeping with a poison potion theme.

Waste not want not, so I used from of the scraps of paper to embellish the hats going around one of the cones, and one of the brims.

I had so much fun with these and cannot wait to play with some more of the goodies that were sent to me so check back!

The best part is,  one of you will get to play with some goodies of your own because the awesome folks at Oriental Trading Company are offering one of my readers the chance to win a $25 gift card to their site! It's easy to enter (using Rafflecopter) and winner will be announced next Tues ( 10/8). Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway


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Birthday Present Idea: Card Kit In An Altered Box

Not only am I luck enough to share a birthday month with two of my oldest and bestest friends, as fate would have it, they share the same date! They both get to remind me that I am in one case, a few days older and in another, a year older, but September is our month. They also share the date with another friend of mine from work. 

Like me, one of my besties also celebrated her 32nd birthday for the 18th time. Every year when we get together to celebrate, she tells me that she re-purposes many of the cards I send her throughout the year into her own ( fabulous) cards. So I decided last year, I would make her a "card kit in a box" to include all kinds of goodies she could use to make her own cards, re-purpose mine etc. 

I started with a cigar box and for no reason other than I did, went over all of the edges with silver tape before I Mod Podged on the paper. Michaels recently had paper stacks on sale for $5 and I picked up a great one by Crate Paper in pinks, oranges, neutrals and browns. 

Since all of the papers coordinated, I just randomly chose patterns and tore pieces, used scraps did whatever felt right. Then I added some black and clear stickers in a vintage theme. 

To finish it off, I cut layers of flowers using a Tim Holtz die, and then used a scrap of the paper along with a Tim Holtz "Ornate Plate" and Glossy Accents to make a faux closure for the box. 

I filled the box with blank cards, embellishments, baker's twine and papers so she can play. I made her birthday card using some of the same papers and some KandCo 3D birthday stickers:

She and I celebrated on Saturday by going to one of my favorite places, Shipwreck Beads.  which is a creative person's candy store. Since we were celebrating a milestone birthday. I picked up these mini glittered top hats for us to wear ( and yes, we did wear them and no, I'm not showing you!) 

I used the same colors and papers to make birthday cards for my two other special birthday buddies.

BFF Open House Link Party #124 and Features

Hope the first official week of Fall was a good one for you. Here we are on the cusp of October which is hard to believe. The crafterverse is in full creative mode so here are a few features from last week's party that inspired me. 

You all know I have a slight paper addiction. I'm looking forward to using some of mine up making a big bouquet of these paper flowers from Artsy VaVa

Can't even tell you how much I love these confetti pumpkins from Kim at Made In A Day. Oh. Em. Gee. 

If you need an easy way to bring some fall into your home, check out this idea from Fonda at Southern Scraps. Wouldn't this look great next to some confetti pumpkins?

This week's chocolate feature speaks for itself. Chocolate truffles from the aptly named blog Dieter's Downfall. Resistance is futile. 

OK let's see what you all have been up to this week !

A Shakespeare Halloween: Toil and Trouble Printable

I'm planning on swapping out my Edgar Allen Poe themed mantle for another guy this year. Bill. Will. The Bard. You know "that Shakespeare dude".  It occurred to me that Shakespeare has a lot of quotes and themes that are perfect for Halloween. Some are obvious like Macbeth, which was the inspiration for this printable. A quote from the Three Witches. 

I created this one in PicMonkey. You should be able to click on to bring to full resolution, then right click to save as. If you use, I'd love to see how! 

BFF Open House # 123 Happy Fall Features!

Can you believe it's time for Summer to come to an end this weekend? Doesn't it seem like it just started? Truthfully, I am really ready for Fall. I love the crispness of the air, the changing of the leaves, sweaters, boots...

You all are gearing up for Fall if last week's party is any indication. Lots of wonderful Fall and Halloween ideas. Let's see a few:

Antonella from Quilling, Art and Expression shared this delightfully spooky spider card. I just love the dimension on the spider and of course the black and white! I can't wait to get started on some Halloween cards. 

You have to check out these DIY Felt Halloween Pillows from Christine at I Dig Pinterest. Love how simple yet bold they are. 

Wouldn't Christine's pillows work perfectly with this Fall wreath shared by Laura at The Shed? You will have to go visit to find out the secret for making these flowers. Can't wait to try. 

And after you're done making these great projects or before you sit down to pin them on Pinterest, be sure to whip up a batch of these Caramel Milky Way brownies from Danielle at Busy Mom's Helper.  When I think Fall, I think caramel. Of course chocolate is year round. YUM!

Now on to this week's party. What tricks and treats do you have up your sleeve this week?