Vanilla Ice Cream Topped with DIY Frozen Strawberry Hearts

red-frozen-strawberry-hearts-valentine-ice-cream-banana

We love February.

We love ice cream.

And our daughter’s still love the movie Frozen.

So, with vanilla ice cream topped with frozen strawberry hearts, we figured we couldn’t go wrong. We were right! This easy, simple and delicious dessert has been a hit around our houses, and it’s so cute, we can’t wait to make it for friends and family.

Surprise your loved ones this month{after all, it is the month of love} with ice cream topped with frozen strawberry hearts.

frozen-valentine-red-banana-strawberry-heart-diy-dessert-

red-frozen-strawberry-heart-bowl-banana-ice-cream-dessert

Here’s how…

Ingredients
Strawberries
Sugar
Wilton Mini Heart Silicone Mold
Vanilla Ice Cream
Bananas
Wilton Round Linzer Cutter Set

How to Create
Cut off the stems from about 8-10 strawberries and place them in a blender or Cuisinart.
Add 1-2 tablespoons sugar.
Puree the strawberries and sugar together until smooth.
Use a spoon to fill heart silicone mold with strawberries puree. Fill the molds to the top, without overflowing them.
Place in a freezer bag and freeze for at least 3 hours.
Once the hearts are set and you’re ready for some ice cream, scoop vanilla ice cream in a bowl, and simply press the strawberry frozen hearts out with your fingers.
We love vanilla ice cream with bananas, so we also used a Wilton Round Linzer Cutter to cut slices of bananas into small hearts, and froze them along with the strawberries. The combo of strawberries, bananas and vanilla ice cream was delicious…in fact, the bowl was devoured in less than 2 minutes!

bowl-ice-cream-red-love-valentine

 {images via j. sorelle}

DIY Funny Valentine’s Underwear for Girlfriends

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We’ve shared Valentine’s gifts for…

Now it’s time for a funny gift for our girlfriends. And, it’s adorned with their Hollywood crushes.

Alison, we took your custom, days-of-the-week underwear for your daughter to a whole new, slightly more inappropriate level! It was a fun and easy project to do…and our girlfriends got a good laugh.

valentines-mail-mailbox-heart-bradley-cooper-crush-valentine-diy-underwear

Here’s how you can do it too.

  • For inspiration, see Alison’s easy tutorial.
  • Find cute underwear, investigate who your girlfriends have secret or not-so-secret crushes on and find good photos that you plan to iron on to underwear. We found our heart underwear at Target.
  • Print the labels on Avery Dark Transfer Paper. Follow the directions on the packaging.
  • Buy mini mailboxes for cute packaging. We found ours at Target.
  • Create tags using Illustrator or Microsoft Word.

bradley-cooper-underwear-heart-valentine-gift-DIY-crush

ryan-gosling-mailbox-valentine-crush-panty-underwear-girlfriend-gift-DIY-heart

Our girlfriends received a funny and gorgeous package in the mail this week…and it’s something that will make them laugh every time they put on their ‘hollywood hunk & heart’ underwear.

mailbox-red-bradley-cooper-heart-underwear-panty-valentine-gift-DIY

{images via j. sorelle}

DIY Valentine for Teachers

valentine-teacher-dig-box-red-socks-heart-slippers

We are letting our teachers know just how warm and fuzzy they make our kids feel with socks this year.

Target was our source for the cute slipper socks adorned with stripes and a heart. We also scored with pillow boxes and sparkly red tape from Target’s $1 and $3 bins.

We used Microsoft Word to create the tag, so you can easily do it too.

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You’ll score extra points with your child’s teacher, and their toes will be warm and toasty all winter long.

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{images via j. sorelle}

 

DIY Pencil + Crayon Cupid Arrow

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Valentine’s Day is still a month away, but we’re in the mood for love. And we’ve been struck by the cutest bow and arrow ever!

If you’re opting for a non-candy Valentine, or want to play cupid on February 14, this is the arrow for you.

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Materials Needed

How To Create Our Crayola Love Struck Arrow:

  1. Fill the silicone tray with old or new bits of crayons to the top.
  2. Bake at 250 degrees for 13 minutes. Once the tray cools a bit, place in freezer for 5-10 minutes. The hearts should pop right out.
  3. Use a drill to drill a small hole in the top-middle part of the heart, so the tip of the pencil fits into the heart similar to a pencil sharpener. Don’t drill the hole too big, but if it’s not fitting just right, add some glue to the tip of the pencil and insert.
  4. For the end of the arrow, cut felt and either glue the two pieces together or if you use sticker felt like us, just press the two pieces together, sandwiching the pencil.

If you want to package for classmates or a friend, place the arrow in a thin cellophane bag and seal with washi tape.

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{images via j. sorelle}

How to Throw a Colorful NYE Party with Paper

when the clock strikes midnight

If you blinked, Christmas is over, and a new year is now upon us. The thought of throwing another party can be totally overwhelming, but what if we told you that it could be easy and cost-efficient to #ColorizeYourParty and you could do it primarily with paper?

Intrigued?

Good, because we put together a colorful and fun way to ring in the New Year with Astrobrights Papers that you, too, can put together in less than a day.

Just like Cinderella, we hope year 2015 is a fairy tale for you. However, unlike Cinderella, When the Clock Strikes Midnight, a magical spell will not be broken, but another year will begin. A new beginning. A fresh start. Another chance. A new love. An opportunity for adventure. Travel. Good times {and some bad times too}. Lessons to be learned.

To celebrate 2015 and the magic that happens When the Clock Strikes Midnight, here’s 3 ways you can #ColorizeYourParty

Countdown Clock and Wishes
Colorize Your Party with a large, colorful clock made from paper. Print and cut out numbers, as well as the big hand and little hand, then stick to a wall. You can use a Silhouette cutting tool like we did, or you don’t need a fancy program at all – you can print numbers via Microsoft Word, and then cut. We used DAP BlueStik reusable adhesive putty to stick the paper to the wall, so it’s easily removable and reusable. Every hour, you can move the ‘hands’ as the midnight hour approaches.

when the clock strikes midnight

when the clock strikes midnight

Before the clock strikes midnight, encourage your guests to write wishes for friends, family and loved ones at the party. Your guests will go home with the mason jars as favors, along with heart-felt wishes for 2015. Remember to use colorful Astrobrights Papers to add labels to the top of the mason jars, and 2015 Wishes tags with twine. For extra table height, wrap small boxes like a package with colorful paper.

when the clock strikes midnight

when the clock strikes midnight NYE party

when the clock strikes midnight NYE party

when the clock strikes midnight NYE party

NYE Essentials Wall
Whether you hope for a magical, butterflies-in-your-stomach kiss, a first kiss, an old but favorite kiss, a kiss from your children or a kiss from a friend, this NYE Essentials wall will ensure everyone will have soft lips, good breath and confetti to throw when the clock strikes midnight. We filled 98 cent plastic ornaments with DIY paper confetti {we used a good old-fashioned hole punch to create bright confetti from Astrobrights Papers}, custom labeled lip balm and pink and white tic-tacs.

NYE colorful party with Astrobrights Papers

NYE confetti

NYE party with confetti

To make the wall more eye-catching, we hung tinsel and white twinkle lights with Painter’s Tape, and strung the ornaments on the tinsel. For the big ribbon banner made entirely of paper, we simply printed our sign, added Martha Stewart glitter to NYE letters, glued 3 sheets of paper together, bent the paper and taped the ends to the wall. As for ‘tails’ of the ribbon, we cut the paper and taped it to the wall.

NYE colorful confetti party

NYE midnight ESSENTIALS

NYE party essentials

NYE party essentials

NYE party confetti

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Photo Booth
We thought about doing a glitter photo booth, or even a photo booth with all kinds of paper props, but a simple geometric background with the words This is How G-double-O-D I looked in 2014 seemed like the most honest and to-the-point backdrop for our NYE celebration. You have to own your hotness in 2014 to look even better in 2015, right? We think so.

photo booth this is how good i looked

For the geometric backdrop, we simply cut Astrobrights Papers into 8×8 squares, and then cut it diagonally in half. We used 4 different colors, and once all the triangles were cut, we used a glue stick to stick it to a wood board. For the words, we used a Silhouette cutting machine, but you can trace or print your own letters.

NYE photo booth

We hope you create a unique and memorable celebration using Astrobrights Papers to #ColorizeYourParty, and we wish you a happy, safe and healthy 2015!

Stay inspired all year-long with Astrobrights Papers via Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram and Twitter.

{images via j. sorelle}

side note about our model: Major props to Jessica’s hubby {the handsome model in our photo booth}, who not only took care of an entire family infected with Influenza A before, during and after Christmas, but kindly modeled for our backdrop despite lack of sleep and rest, when we were too sick to do so. 

j. sorelle received products and/or payment for this post, however we love Astrobrights Papers even if they didn’t send us product, and all opinions are ours, we promise. View all of Astrobrights vibrant colors here