Pinterest has sucked me in again, but this time with success! I landed on the One Good Thing blog where she makes a DIY version of the Poo-Pourri Spray. Now I’ve never used that spray, so I can’t say how it compares, but let me tell you this stuff works.

At first I thought it was just like a room spray and you do your biz and the spray the room. Ok, so what’s the big deal?

Nope, you spray it in the toilet before biz time and by some magic it blocks the smell. For realsies.

The spray smells really good, too. It’s a mix of grapefruit, bergamot, and lemongrass essential oils. Wait, don’t leave! I’m not about to tout the magical healing powers of these oils and start selling them to you…I roll my eyes at that stuff. But I do think they smell amazing and it was kinda fun to try this little project.

I ordered the cheapie oils from Amazon and was pretty pleased with the quality. The brand that I used is not for consumption, but I think some of the more expensive ones are. I wasn’t planning on drinking the poo-pourri spray, so no worries there!

If you check out the post on One Good Thing, she’s made a cute printable for “No. 2 Spray” that you can add to your bottle. I didn’t get that fancy with mine.

*Please note: One of my sweet readers let me know that the citrus oils will eat through plastic, so it’s best to use a glass or stainless steel bottle. I’ve been using a plastic bottle for a few months and haven’t had any problems. I think the water dilutes it enough, but best to be in the know!

DIY Poo-Pourri “No. 2” Spray

Ingredients:

20 drops Lemongrass Essential Oil
20 drops Bergamot Essential Oil
20 drops Grapefruit Essential Oil
2 ounces water
small spray bottle (I picked up a cheap one at Target in the travel toiletries section*)

*Please note: The citrus oils will eat through plastic, so it’s best to use a glass or stainless steel bottle. I've been using a plastic bottle for a few months and haven't had any problems. I think the water dilutes it enough, but best to be in the know!

Directions:

1. Fill the bottle with water and add the oils.

To use:

1. Shake every time before you spray it since the oil and water will never stay mixed.

2. Spray 3 to 4 sprays directly on the water in the toilet before biz time. The oils make a barrier on the water and offensive odors don't escape.

Source: One Good Thing

This post contains affiliate links.

Copyright © 2009-2020 Leah Claire - Leah Claire

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I wanted a few items sweet and a few items savory. I also wanted to have everything in grab and go sizes, so no one was holding up the line trying to scoop cheeseball onto a cracker.

On the menu:

Sweet
Blackberry Chocolate Cupcakes
Soft Frosted Sugar Cookies
Dipped Pretzels
Dipped Strawberries

Savory
Ham & Swiss Sliders
Contessa Chicken Salad in Mini Fillo Shells
Spinach Dip with Veggies in Baguettes

The Blackberry Chocolate Cupcakes were my favorite. A little different cupcake combination, but I figured if raspberries and chocolate went well together, then blackberries and chocolate just had to, too! It’s a basic chocolate cupcake filled with blackberry preserves and topped with a blackberry buttercream. The blackberries helped color the buttercream a bit, but I also used violet food coloring to get that light shade of purple.

I’ve been wanting to make these Soft Frosted Sugar Cookies for a while and now I finally had a reason. I used the same violet food coloring to tint my icing and I thought they turned out a lovely shade of lavender. I made them sparkle just a bit with coarse white sugar sprinkled on top. The cookies turned out to be quite huge, but they were delicious. I have a weakness for soft, buttery cookies and these didn’t disappoint.

I’ve seen these Dipped Pretzels everywhere. Salty and sweet together, it’s the perfect snack. I dipped the pretzel rods in white almond bark and once they were set, I melted lavender candy melts and drizzled it over the top.

I’m a huge fan of Dipped Strawberries. Sweet and juicy strawberries underneath and a coating of candy on top. Take a bite and the candy crackles and gives in to the succulent strawberry. It’s mostly fruit, so it’s got to be healthy right? I dipped these in the same almond bark and lavender candy as the pretzels.

I forgot to take a picture of the Ham & Swiss Sliders. My friend Meghan made these from an earlier post on my blog. Let me tell you they were a hit. Meghan doesn’t even like onions or Swiss cheese and she loves these little sandwiches. How’s that for how good they are?!

I consider myself to be a chicken salad connoisseur. My absolute favorite is from O’Carr’s in Birmingham, Alabama. I’ve come close to finding a recipe that is pretty similar with the Barefoot Contessa’s Chicken Salad. It has both pecans and walnuts and halves of purple grapes. See how I tied in the purple? I made them easy to handle and bite-sized by stuffing it into mini fillo shells.

Here’s another recipe I’ve been dying to make. Serving Spinach Dip with Veggies in a Baguette is so cute. It’s the best of both worlds. Why decide between dipping veggies or bread? Have both!

Allison’s mom made this incredible Raspberry Sherbet Punch. It’s simple to make with raspberry lemonade, ginger ale, scoops of raspberry sherbet, and frozen raspberries. It’s perfect party punch and I wouldn’t mind drinking this poolside with a splash of vodka! (It’s fizzy in this picture because it’s freshly stirred.)

I wanted to make sure everyone knew what they were eating, so I made these cute food label cards. They’re actually business cards from Avery. I found a purple striped template from their website and altered it to use as a label. The cards are two of the business cards, still attached, so they would stand up on the table.

I kept my crafty hat on and made these tissue pom poms. I followed this tutorial from Martha Stewart, using purple tissue and lavender tissue. I think these would also be pretty using both colors in one pom pom. I chose the pointy cut ends instead of rounded.

Hosting a bridal shower isn’t all about the food. It’s about the games! I found the Staches & Tiaras game on Craftaholics Anonymous. I made the tiaras out of sparkly purple scrapbook paper and the moustaches out of black textured scrapbook paper. I used a template to outline the shapes and glued craft sticks to the back.

Guests had to guess who answered the questions I read out loud. Hold up the stache if you think it’s Chris, hold up the tiara if you think it’s Allison.

This game is hysterical!

As you can see we had a lot of fun with this one!

Another game was Advice to the Letter. Meghan made these cute cards that spelled A-L-L-I-S-O-N. Each guest had to write advice to the bride using each letter in the bride’s name.

The cards are great keepsakes for the bride.

Let’s not forget about the gifts! Here’s the bride posing with her new robe that reads “Bride” on the back.

This was the last gift Allison opened. It’s a knife and server set, a picture frame, and engraved flutes from her mom and dad. This got a lot of oohs and aahs and maybe a few teary eyes. Congratulations to Allison and Chris!

Upcoming posts will feature the recipes for Blackberry Chocolate Cupcakes, Soft Frosted Sugar Cookies, Contessa Chicken Salad, and Spinach Dip with Veggies in Baguettes. This blog post is featured in Foodbuzz’s March 24×24. 24 unique meals all happening in a 24-hour period, hosted by 24 Foodbuzz featured publishers. A big thank you to Foodbuzz for selecting this Lavender & Purple Bridal Shower as one of the featured posts!

Copyright © 2009-2020 Leah Claire - Leah Claire

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Happy Halloween!

Remember the Candy Corn Fudge I made, but didn’t love the taste? Well, ta da! These cute little Gremlins are the result of me not wanting to waste food. I’ve made these butterscotch and chocolate clusters numerous times before, but never thought about adding candy and turning them into critters. Aren’t they cute?!

So, how’s it taste?

They taste good! I melted down my Candy Corn Fudge and stirred in the chow mein noodles. The noodles helped offset the sweet. For one batch, I swirled in melted semi-sweet chocolate chips. While I enjoyed these, I recommend sticking to the original recipe and not making the fudge. This was just a way for me to not waste candy. I cannot stand to throw food away. I’ve made a few variations of this recipe in the past and all have turned out great. You can use the combination of butterscotch and chocolate chips, or you can use all butterscotch or all chocolate chips. You can also reduce the chow mein noodles by 1 cup and add 1 cup of peanuts. It’s up to you!

I was feeling really festive this Halloween, so for your crafty enjoyment, here’s a Smashed Witch Pencil I made. I giggle every time I see this. It’s hysterical and pretty easy to make. Here’s how I did it:

For 4 witches you’ll need:

4  pieces orange pipe cleaner (6 inch)
4  pieces white pipe cleaner (6 inch)
4  pencils
Heavy kitchen scissors or wire cutter
4  brown pipe cleaners (12 inch)
White paper or tissue paper
1  square black craft felt (about 10×8 inch)
4  green pom-poms (1/2 inch)
Tacky white craft glue or low-temperature hot glue

1. To make each smashed witch pencil, twist 1 orange and 1 white pipe cleaner piece together. Fold and wrap pipe cleaners in half around pencil about 2 1/2 inches from eraser end; twist 2 or 3 times to secure and create legs of witch. Bend ends of twisted pipe cleaners, creating toes/feet of witch.

2. With scissors or wire cutter, cut brown pipe cleaner into 4 (3-inch) pieces. Gather 3 pieces into bundle; wrap remaining piece around middle of bundle and twist once and attach to pencil below the orange and white pipe cleaners. Bend, twist and shape the remaining pieces to resemble witch’s broom.

3. Using paper, trace pattern pieces; cut out. Cut cape from black felt. Cut and discard top point of cape. Glue cape to pencil about 3/4 inch above legs, leaving end loose to flop over broom. Glue pom-pom to top point of cape for head.

4. Cut circle from black felt to create brim of hat. Glue brim centered over “head.” Cut cone of hat. Spread glue along one short side of triangle; overlap other short side and press with fingers to secure the glued area.* Trim excess felt. Glue cone to hat brim. Repeat for remaining witch pencils.

*I found the tacky craft glue doesn’t love to stick to felt, so I ended up sticking a straight pen in the felt to form the hat cone. This method obviously isn’t for kids, so you may want to try the hot glue gun route instead of the craft glue.

This past weekend, my friend Carol and I ran in the Zombie 5K here in Nashville. We decided to bring back the 80s and run from the zombies in style. I don’t know what was scarier, us or the zombies!

Later that night, I went as the Black Swan. I was pretty proud of my makeup skills! What costume did you wear this year?

Gremlins

Pillsbury
makes 24 gremlins
per gremlin: 100 calories, 4.5g fat, 14g carbs, 3g fiber, 0g protein

Ingredients:

1 cup butterscotch chips
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
2 cups chow mein noodles (or 1 cup noodles + 1 cup nuts)
48 miniature candy-coated chocolate baking bits

Directions:

1. In 2-quart saucepan, heat butterscotch chips and chocolate chips over low heat, stirring constantly, until melted and smooth.

2. Gently stir in chow mein noodles until well coated. Drop mixture onto wax paper by teaspoonfuls to form 24 "gremlins." Press 2 baking bits onto each to resemble eyes. Refrigerate until set.

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