Boboli/houseparty.com host!

i wish i remember what blog introduced me to houseparty.com, but i don't remember :( and i wish i did so i could tell them thank you for sharing!!

what is houseparty.com?
A House Party™ is thousands of parties across the country, hosted by people like you. Each event is sponsored by a leading brand and focuses on something cool that the sponsor wants its best fans to experience firsthand and share with their friends. As a registered member of House Party you have the opportunity to host a House Party for your friends and family while checking out some kind of new product. If you're selected as a host for a particular House Party, you can use our website to invite your friends and family over for your House Party, share your pictures and videos, and explore thousands of parties being held in homes across the country. Each host for any event receives a Party Package that contains items to help enhance the party for you and your guests – and YES, the Party Package is completely FREE!
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so when i went to sign myself up, i immediately "applied" to be a host of the Boboli Beat BBQ Boredom house party. to be honest, i forgot all about it until 6 weeks later i got an email that i was in the running to be a host!! woot woot! they chose a certain amount of people and the first 2000 people that responded and filled out the info, got picked! and again, being honest here, i'm attached to my email! i get alerts on my phone :/ that's sad, i know. but anyways, after freaking out over a crashed website for about 30 minutes, i was finally able to submit my info and got an email a few minutes later that i was chosen!

so what happens next is my party supplies are sent to me and i start my planning. this party is sponsored by Boboli Pizza Crust and they want all the pizzas to be grilled on the bbq. they send coupons to purchase the crust, suggested recipes (not mandatory) and other "goodies" for my guest. kind of like a mini swag bag :) and i got my box today!

here's the enclosed letter...

picture frame magnets for my guest

recipe cards to send home with my guest

my coupons as well as coupons to send home with the guest

flyer with grilling tips

food tent (made me laugh because i had to invite 14 people, and there is no way this would cover all the pizzas)

and lastly, the reusable shopping bags. which i'm obsessed with collecting from nearly every store i go to!

i need to get going on the planning aspects of this! it's only 2 weeks away! i'm lucky enough to have a friend wendy (and her husband mark) who have an amazing house for parties and has offered hers up for this event. so far i know we want to turn it into a competition between our families as to who comes up with the best pizza. any other ideas? please share!

5th wedding anniversary (strictly for journaling purposes)

last weekend was our 5th wedding anniversary! holy smokes has it flown by! here's a quick recap...

when we started dating...

30 days of dating, then we got engaged here... (at a cemetary)

83 days later... our wedding day <3 at the  San Diego Temple

i don't have a picture of our first anniversary! but we went to utah to see family (for me, it was the first time meeting most of them)

2nd anniversary... we went to Sea World and had dinner with Shamu, literally. it was AWESOME!!!

our 3rd anniversary... i remember taking a picture, but i was icky looking thanks to morning sickness so i deleted them all. but we went to the elephant bar for dinner. i've had better food.

4th anniversary... you can read about it here...

and finally our 5th year... the traditional gift is wood. so we ate with chopsticks! we got together with the moore's and handy's (our newfound peeps, woot woot) and all pitched in and made jarens moms FABULOUS sweet and sour pork w/ shrimp wontons as well as cream cheese wontons. thanks wendy for letting us stink up your house! and thanks willow for the dessert!!

this pic was taken a month before our anniversary, but i swear, we still look the same!

to my wonderful husband... thanks for changing my life for the better :) you should i know i love you because i don't get grossed out when the toilet seat is still warm. LOL.

ramblings...

i had a baby shower to go to earlier this week. i wanted to include some handmade items along with the gift card i pitched in for with some friends. man how i love free patterns online! thank you to all those creative ladies who share their thoughts!

first, i whipped up this crochet shell cap. the bow (also a free pattern), isn't attached to the hat. but on an alligator clip that can be removed and attached to a headband as well. she also got 10 other flowers/crocheted bows on clips with 8 crocheted headbands in any color you can think of!

i also made a dress for the new baby out of leftover fabric i've had since christmas :)

and a tag blanket that's minkee on one side, and silk on the other. again, out of leftover supplies :)

we're going camping in a few weeks and my mom wanted some sort of hat (not a beanie) to wear. so i found this pattern for the belliveau cove hat. oh, and it's not weird i bought a styrofoam head to help me crochet is it? ROFL!

Cabin Time!

my friend willow (who needs a blog because her life is constantly full of laughs) has connections to a cabin nearby. on monday she invited me along for the ride to drop off a mattress up there. it's about an hour and a half away, 20 degrees cooler than the bakersfield heat, lots of dirt for a boy to play in, peaceful beautiful scenery, and random cows.

off for a short hike to big rock...

i believe we saw 11 cows total. random right? can't wait for our upcoming family cabin/camping trip in a few weeks!

Smocked Towel Dresses

remember when i tried my hand at smocking? then i saw this post here and fell in love with it! so this past weekend when i had my 3 nieces over for a slumber party, and the following day was a pool party, i of course just had to make them! helpful tip: i found that the cheaper quality towels work better  :)

Milk and Cookies Baby Shower

i threw a baby shower last week with a friend from church for another friend from church. it was a milk and cookies theme.

i made diaper banners and hung them throughout my house.

we played FUN games! of course the traditional, "how many are in the bottle". we also played, "name that tune". where the title of the song had the word baby in it and they got 1 point each for guessing the song and the artist. and lastly, "name that celebrity baby name", where you matched up the WACKY baby names to their famous parents.

i contacted (thanks to the wonderful facebook) the sister-in-law of the new mom and asked her to email me pictures of the new baby and printed them out, framed them and used them as part of the decor.

we had around 20 dozen cookies to munch on! as the shower favor, we bought white lunch sacks, printed out a sticker label that matched the theme and each lady got to take home however many cookies they wanted :)

our beverage area with of course, my fav, the diaper baby.

i made personalized water bottle labels. i loved this! added a friendly touch to it.

she got quite the loot of diapers and wipes!

oh these darn martha stewart tissue paper pom poms! i've been trying the last 2+ years to "master" making these and mine turn out HORRIBLY! thankfully, my shower thrower partner made awesome ones!

overall, great turnout, great food, great gifts, couldn't ask for more than that!

p.s. AFTER the shower i went and saw twilight eclipse and didn't get home til 130am. i'm too old to hang with the big girls! lol. but btw, i LOVED the movie and it made me even a bigger fan!