Gorilla Bread

1/2 cup granulated sugar

3 teaspoons cinnamon

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese

2 (12-ounce) cans refrigerated biscuits (10 count)

1 1/2 cups coarsely chopped walnuts

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

1. Spray a bundt pan with nonstick cooking spray. Mix the granulated sugar and cinnamon. In a saucepan, melt the butter and brown sugar over low heat, stirring well; set aside. 

2. Cut the cream cheese into 20 equal cubes. Press the biscuits out with your fingers and sprinkle each with 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon sugar. Place a cube of cream cheese in the center of each biscuit, wrapping and sealing the dough around the cream cheese. 

3. Sprinkle 1/2 cup of the nuts into the bottom of the bundt pan. Place half of the prepared biscuits in the pan. Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar, pour half of the melted butter mixture over the biscuits, and sprinkle on 1/2 cup of nuts. 

4. Layer the remaining biscuits on top, sprinkle with the remaining cinnamon sugar, pour the remaining butter mixture over the biscuits, and sprinkle with the remaining 1/2 cup of nuts. 

5. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool for 5 minutes. Place a plate on top and invert.

And don't be dumb like me - please keep the leftovers in the fridge not on the counter!! DUH MANDY!!

Thank you for visiting Shabby Pumpkin!

High School Musical Invite

Last year my little sister had a HSM themed sleepover with her friends in celebration of finishing 2nd grade. I had so much fun making her invites, but since I "borrowed" some logos from Disney I haven't been able to show it off on my old business website.  So the invite has been sitting in a folder on my computer just waiting to be showed off, well I figured I can finally show it off here.

I love simple touches and details like this - these invites were personalized just for Danielle (for her very first sleepover) and she was so proud to hand them out to her friends at school. 


The great thing is that an invite like this can be created for any theme - army, cowboys, princess, or even a mystery themed party.  Much better than a little store bought invite any day!


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Make your own glasses strap

One of my little dudes, Sawyer, had to get glasses this month.  And let me tell you the fun you can have trying to keep glasses on a ten month old!!  Even worse, his twin liked to pull them off too.  Good times.  So I went out and purchased a glasses strap from a local eye store to help me out.  It wasn't too expensive, but I had to retrofit it to work with his glasses, it was broken in three days and was a pain to put on anyway.  As the days have gone by Sawyer keeps his glasses on more and more, thank goodness!  But when he does pull them off I'm always worried about him or Cooper banging them on the ground.  I figured I needed to make a strap to just keep them hanging on his neck until I can get to him to put the glasses back on but didn't want to spend another $6.00.  So I headed to the sewing machine.

**Disclaimer: I have been sewing for exactly one month!  I am not an expert and I just basically make it up as I go.

P.S. These pictures are awful - I'm quickly figuring out that our new place has horrible lighting for taking pictures in manual mode.  Sorry!

You'll need an iron, fabric, a way to cut the fabric (I like my rotary blade), and a sewing machine.  I'm sure you could and sew this if you're super awesome at straight lines - I am not. 

I cut two lengths of fabric one inch wide.  And I guessed at the length for now - it was 17 inches.  Then I pinned the two pieces right sides together and sew 1/4 inch seams.

Once it was pieced together I felt the edges were too long so I trimmed them 1/8 of an inch.

Then turn it inside out and press.

I grabbed Sawyer's old strap and used that to get and idea of how long it needed to be.  I cut mine 13 inches to allow for the sewing the frame holders.

To create the frame holders I folded 1/4 inch, pressed, folded another 1/4 inch, pressed and pinned.  I then sewed half way through the folded fabric.

Do that to both side, attach to glasses and see if you need any other changes.

Otherwise grab your little rugrat and see if they work.

Although these are doing the job I wanted, as an afterthought - a little piece of elastic in the back would have been great.  Oh well, maybe next time!


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Framed Letter

*Here's another older tutorial I had in my computer archives from when I was decorating my twins' nursery last year.

Looking around for decorating ideas for the little boys' nursery I came across an idea to hang a framed letter above each of their cribs. I found the idea HERE at Make It and Love It, one of my favorite blogs. While I was in JoAnn's gathering supplies I had an idea to make my version a little more dimensional.

I found 11"x14" frames at Michael's on sale for $4.99 as well as wooden letters for each of the twins' initials. At JoAnn's I was lucky to get fabric quarters on sale for $0.99 in a design that would work for both babies as well as chocolate colored card stock. At home all I needed was an iron, Mod Podge, a foam brush and scissors.

1. Iron out the fabric quarter to remove the creases and disassemble the frame. Using the glass as a template, cut the fabric large enough to leave about one inch around each side.

2. Apply Mod Podge to one side of the glass with your foam brush. Working quickly so it does not dry before attaching the fabric. Attach the fabric as quickly as possible and smooth from the middle out towards the edges. I found it easiest to have the fabric laying on my work surface and press the glue side down to fabric.

3. Apply about one inch wide of Mod Podge to clean side of glass and fold each edge of fabric over. Using a little extra on the fabric where it will overlap. This step doesn't need to be perfect since it will be on the back and hidden behind the back of the frame. 

4. Let dry, then put the frame back together as it was purchased, just like a picture.

Originally, I had planned to cover the front of my letters with a chocolate cards stock that matched my fabric. So if you too would like to do this, just trace the letter and cut it out.

Here's what the project would look like with the letter covered.

But upon a second look, I decided that I like the white letter better. Our cribs are white and I felt that it would work better for this purpose.

However, I still felt I need an extra addition of color. And since we're using chocolate brown as a main color in the nursery I decided to head back to JoAnn's for another addition. I found a scrumptious chocolate brown satin 1.5" ribbon and decided I would hang the frames on the wall with these ribbons. Luckily, large frames have two wall hooks for stability and I just threaded the ribbon through these and made a bow at the top.

So here's the final project. Not what I originally pictured, but typically my crafts take on another direction while I am in the process. And although it's not what I had in mind, I love it more now. I think the ribbon made a great addition.

In the end this project took me about 10 minutes and cost less than $7.00 each including my supplies at home. I think $14 to decorate a wall of a nursery isn't too shabby!