A Cookie Cutter Diva's Life

I made these for a treat for the kids tonight! They looooved them!!

Only I did mine in blue rather than pink since I have two boys that would throw a fit haha

1 box Betty Crocker® SuperMoist® yellow cake mix
Water, vegetable oil and eggs called for on cake mix box
1 cup candy-coated chocolate candies
18 flat-bottom ice cream cones
3 containers (12 oz each) Betty Crocker® Whipped strawberry frosting
1/4 cup Betty Crocker® candy decors


1 Heat oven to 350°F (or 325°F for dark or nonstick pans). Place paper baking cup in each of 18 regular-size muffin cups; place mini paper baking cup in each of 18 mini muffin cups. Make cake mix as directed on box, using water, oil and eggs. Spoon evenly into regular and mini muffin cups.
2 Bake mini cupcakes 11 to 13 minutes, regular cupcakes 17 to 22 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Remove from pans to cooling racks. Cool completely, about 30 minutes.
3 If ice cream cone holder is unavailable, make a holder for the cones by tightly covering the tops of 2 empty square or rectangular pans (at least 2 to 2 1/2 inches deep) with heavy-duty foil. With sharp knife, cut 18 "stars" in foil, 3 inches apart, by making slits about 1 inch long.
4 Place about 2 teaspoons candies in each ice cream cone. Remove paper cups from cupcakes. For each cone, frost top of 1 regular cupcake with frosting; turn upside down onto a cone. Frost bottom (now the top) of cupcake. Place mini cupcake upside down on frosted regular cupcake; frost side of regular cupcake and entire mini cupcakes completely (it's easiest to frost from the cone toward the top). Sprinkle with candy decors. Push cone through foil opening in cone holder; the foil will keep it upright.

Todays adventure pulled out of the "Summer Fun Jar" was a "Balloon Party!"

This was a cool thrifty little idea to give them something to do on a bored summer day with out going out and spending any money!

I tend to be crazy when it comes to keeping things like gift bags, streamer, party supplies, etc that we might need again. So of course I had some left over unblown up balloons from one of our past parties and blew those all up and let the kids go wild in the living room!

They played with them throwing them in the air, drew on them and made faces, decorated them, played games, and popped them!





Of course this wound up turning into a tattoo party because at the end the kids thought it'd be more fun to color on themselves and did a little face painting of their own then played like they were an a safari adventure!

Well today we got a few things done and got some appointments scheduled, picked up some shoes for the girls off freecycle, went to the dr to try to get this mess straightened out with getting the kids records transferred to the new drs office (going on 4 months of not getting them now) I need to at least get the shot records for Brooklyn so I can figure out what/if she needs anything for school! The one I have shows she needs 5 shots but I know she had some shots a few months ago so I need to find out for sure! They said they'd fax at least that over but it wasn't there when I checked 2 hours later! So hopefully we get that straight here soon or they finally give it to me so I can get stuff straight and get her enrolled!

Then we headed to the pool and hung out for a few hours there!

Tonight for dinner I made Broccoli and Cheese Soup! Kinda warm for something like that but it turned out super yummy and I was wanting to use some of the stuff I had at the house!


Ingredients
3 (10 ounce) packages frozen chopped broccoli
3 (14.5 ounce) cans chicken broth
6 tablespoons margarine
1 onion, chopped
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups milk
1 1/2 pounds processed cheese food (eg. Velveeta), cubed
5 chopped potatoes
1 pinch ground white pepper


Directions
1.In a large pot over medium heat, simmer the broccoli in the broth for 15 minutes. In a separate skillet over medium heat, melt the butter or margarine, add the onions and saute for 5 minutes, or to desired tenderness.
2.Add the flour to the onions and stir well, forming a pasty substance. Gradually add the milk and stir until thick. Add this mixture to the broccoli mixture in the pot and stir well. Then add the cheese, stirring until melted. Finally, add the pepper. (Note: Be careful not to let the soup boil, or the cheese will break down.)

Lots of fun stuff here today!!

First Peyton had therapy this morning which went really well and she even went pee pee in her potty twice while they were here! They were really impressed with that! Hopefully she will prove to be like her siblings and be potty trained at 2yrs too lol

Then we headed off to 7-11 to get our free slurpees for 7-11's birthday celebration! The kids loved that the best of course! I didn't wind up getting one but my husband said he went to get one on his break haha

Then since the park was just around the corner from where we had to go to get to one I decided to take the kids to play for a bit. It was of course blazing hot and I knew it would be so I didn't plan to stay long but they've been wanting to go to the park so bad! Of course as kids they didn't seem to care much about the heat and played and played and played! The only part that bothered them was the slide lol






When we got done we headed over to Target to use our $2 off coupon for the pillows to get them $.50 each but they were all out! BOO! But I did pick up another pack of pens with another coupon for $35!

After that we headed over to Walmart because I had to pick up some milk and we got our gerber meal for $.33 after our coupon! I totally forgot I had gone there for my milk to get free shavers because I normally try to avoid Walmart lol The kids enjoyed their free cookie there of course too!

Then mommy grabbed a free chickfila sandwhich for lunch to enjoy all alone during nap time!






Spent the rest of the day catching up on the house and laundry and got some stuff together to donate to the local shelter and took a nice long nap! Cooking some lasagna for dinner! Mmmmm mmmmm!!!

My coupon/deals yesterday! Went to Target to get my free sharpies and pens and see if they had any $.20 glue sticks left. Wound up with this..

4 12pk pepsis for $11
colgate toothe paste $1.25 (after 2 coupons)
wet ones $.75 (after coupon)
9 Notebooks $.20ea
2 packs Wooden Pencils $.97ea
White Out $1.94
Perm Markers FREE (after coupon)
Ballpoint Pens $.39 (after coupon)
12 Glue Sticks $.20ea
10 Liquid Glues $.20ea
4 Crayons $.20ea
Large Glue Sticks $2.89
Filler Paper $.75
Fuler $.50
Tape $.89
2 Bags of Sour Patch Kids $1.99 (one was free after 2 coupons)

Spent $33!! Says total Saved was roughly $45!

Then I took back the school supplies I got at Office Depot that I found on Sale and got back $36 so I saved about $26 on school supplies all together and that brings my total down to $42 for all 3 kids (not including back packs)!

Then I went to Staples and I got 2 packs of paper $.25 after rebate and 2 packs of $.01 pens and 2 $.01 glues!

And I had lunch for free with a coupon at Rosas (paid for a margarita lol) while I enjoyed clipping coupons in peace lol

oh boy oh boy oh boy! What a day today has been!!

The kids pulled out "Go See Transformers 3" out of the "Summer Fun" jar! Something they were waiting and dying to do and see it in 3D! Mommy is sad she didn't get to go haha

So this morning I got up and I went to check out the Old Navy $20 Grab Bag deal. I didn't set my alarm because I didn't know if I wanted to go yet and decided I'd wait and see if a few people went and some reviews. I saw some good ones, went down to the store and they had a lot of bags left and then I hear an employee say "it's 5 of the clearance shirts" um.. seriously I knew it was clearance but 5?? I could buy more then that off your clearance rack for $20! Heck I could go buy more then that new on one of your sales specials for that and be happier with what I was getting by knowing for sure we'd use it! No thank you! PASS!

Visited a few garage sales on the way home. Loaded up the truck and took a truck load of recycled stuff down to the recycling center.

Then Bryan headed off with the boys to the movies so I spent some time cleaning out the garage after I took the recycled items. Reorganized a few things and got some stuff cleared out I felt we didn't need and could part with to try to thin things down and posted them on the freebie page.

Bryan picked up 2 boxes for me on the way home which was a great score for me because it was boys items in the size I needed! I was worried that there would be more girl things but I got just what I needed for Aidan so I took that out and passed on the rest!

While I was doing this my lovely daughter who was in and out the garage and coloring ever so peacefully in the living room decided that the kids scissors in the coloring box would be more fun and that she would play hair stylist and cut her own hair!!






Let me tell you.. I must be on some really really good anxiety medicine because I always thought if my kids pulled that I'd beat the crap out of them! All I could do was calmly have a complete cow, take a picture to send to daddy and send her to bed for a nap and take a nice warm relaxing bath while I recovered myself from having a complete mental break down thinking my little girl is starting her first year of school next month with some jacked up hair!! *sigh*




Finished up some laundry, baked some brownies and after dinner decided I couldn't take it anymore and I was going to fix her hair myself! I've cut hair before but obviously I'm not a stylist! I can't do some super cute hair do but I can do what needs to be done at least on a girl lol

Bryan how ever walked in on me and started yelling at me and flipped out about it and we got into it, I locked him out of the bathroom yelling just trust me lol




He was happy with it when I came out thankfully haha I evened it out to one of the layers she had cut which was a little longer then the other layer she cut on the left side. It was still a couple inches shorter but not as short as the complete chop off! Yes it's obvious that it's uneven on one side but it's not as obvious as when it was long in the middle and then chopped on the sides! I think over all it looks kind of cute and better then her hot mess she normally has so I think we might start keeping it like this.

We're going to slowly let the left side even out the next month and hopefully get it all squared away and perfect by the start of school!

She confessed she wanted it short like her friend Natalies and I told her that's completely fine but next time tell us so we can take her to get it done!

We started out our day today with a little appreciation for cows! Chickfila had their annual "Cow Appreciation Day" which we've never done before because we didn't have anything to wear and then I decided we'd get creative today and had a few things at home we could do so with so it would be cost efficient to do so! Plus it gave the kids a little something to do with their day and they got even more excited about the event knowing what they were doing!
So we got some old white shirts we had at home, got out the markers and decorated shirts for all of us to wear that had cows on them and said something funny.
The kids colored their face and spots on their legs and arms and wore some pants to match.






You got either a free entree or free meal based on your costume and how much you dressed up.
All 4 kids got free kids meals and I got a free meal! Nothing like going to eat somewhere and hearing your total is $0!!
The kids had a lot of fun, took lots of pictures and enjoyed seeing the people that came in dressed up!

After we had our lunch we came home and the kids pulled out "Scavenger Hunt" out of the "Summer Fun" jar! So I put together a little scavenger hunt for them to have fun with!

In the first picture they found something red, 2nd picture they had to find a flag, and the last was the end to it all where they had to find their prizes! That of course was their favorite part and a little inexpensive hot wheels and necklace to add a little extra fun to it!

Today is also their day that they get to pull something out of the "Naughty or Nice Jars" if anything is left to see what they are rewarded with for being good! They pulled out "Pizza Night" so we got pizza from Little Caesars to end the evening!