My Creative Blog [Search results for Worthwhile Wear] 

One of the many things we love about this blog is that we can share not only the fun projects we are working on, but also things that are important to us as well. One of those things is an organization called Worthwhile Wear that was started by our close friends, Dan and Steph.

Worthwhile Wear's mission is to rescue young girls from forced prostitution and more importantly, prevent it from ever happening at all. They target the root issues of trafficking: poverty and lack of education, by teaching these girls a trade (making jewelry, bags, scarves etc) and offering them free education and a safe place to stay. For the past year, they've been focusing their efforts in India where they've been working to create vocational centers.

This year Worthwhile Wear is shifting its focus from overseas to something closer to home. In the final part of 2013 Worthwhile Wear will launch a new program called “The Well.” This is a long-term aftercare and housing program for women who have been sexually exploited or trafficked in and around the greater Philadelphia area.

Why is this so important to us? These are our daughters, Kira and Campbell, and we can't even imagine how horrific it is for young girls like them to have to go through what they do as a result of trafficking. To know that it happens here, right where we live, is a sobering thought and we want to be a part of stopping it before it starts.

So, all that to say that Worthwhile Wear is having a party! It's 2nd Annual Worthwhile Evening and we've agreed to help out with decor for the event again. We had so much fun last year with the"Taste of India" theme and want to make this year's party just as awesome! You can read about last year's event here and here, but we pretty much transformed a big, blank room into a fabulous backdrop for the event!

The centerpieces showcased the amazing jewelry made by women who have been rescued from trafficking.

This year's theme is all about water (get it? The Well…), and the decorating committee has some pretty fun ideas up their sleeves.

1. Unknown (anyone know?) 2. The Yummy Life 3. Amazon 4. Weddbook
We want you to come hang out with us at the event! There will be delicious food, good music, beautiful art, a silent auction and a chance to hear from Shandra Woworuntu, a woman who escaped forced prostitution. Here are the deets you need to know: When: Saturday, November 9th from 7-9 PM Where: Calvary Church, 820 Rt. 113, Souderton, Pa 18964 Cost: $35 per ticket, or $30 for groups of 10 or more Purchase tickets here.
Here's the fun part, we're giving away 2 tickets to the event! We would love to have as many of you come to learn more about Worthwhile Wear and be a part of this awesome event, so we wanted to give away two tickets to make that happen for someone! We'll announce the winner next Friday, October 18th. We'd be thrilled if you would share this post with your friends so that we can help Worthwhile Wear change the lives as many girls as possible! Enter below for your chance to win: a Rafflecopter giveaway

If you can't make the event, then go ahead and start your Christmas shopping on their website! Don't want to come to the event or shop, but still want to help? Donate here to help save young girls and give them the hope for a future.
Have a great weekend, everyone!

If we win, Homes.com will give Worthwhile Wear Five Thousand Buckaroos! For a new organization like theirs, that could be a major game changer and we really hope we can win it for them! (If you want to skip the project and just vote you can! lol Click HERE to Vote)
You can read all about our project first, but then you have to pinky promise to follow the voting directions at the bottom of the post okay? Ok! Thanks!
Wood Shim Wall Art I (Monica) have had this project in my mind for a few months now. It was inspired by a printed pattern I had seen in the window of a shop. I couldn't remember exactly where I saw it, but I was pretty sure it was a cool shop we had passed when we were in London in November. Great story right? Crafty DIY project inspired by a European city… Then, two weeks ago it hit me… It was JCrew at our local mall! I just about died laughing when I put it all together! Well, JCrew or London, I sure am glad it inspired me…
For under $20 we created the coolest DIY Wood Shim Wall Art

(You could go vote NOW since you've seen it! Click Here!)
I wanted something with BOLD color, and a modern feel, that married well with a bit of industrial flare!

How's that for a Before and After?
Who knew our dumpy oak piano could be such a show stopper?

Here's a peek at the details- the DIY light isn't my entry, but man I love how it works with the Wood Shim Art! (Light tutorial coming soon!)

(Or you could vote now?)

Want to know how we did it??
You've gotta head over to Homes.com for the full tutorial (but only after you've voted!)
Click HERE for the full tutorial

There were a lot of DIY elements around our Crafting for Charity project, and we'll post about all of them over the next week or so!

And now for the really important stuff! We're blogging for a charity that we love and are so proud to support. Worthwhile Wear was founded by our close friends Dan & Steph and they've committed their time and talents to make it their life's work.

Jess and I both have daughters and we couldn't imagine any of them having to endure human trafficking. We love Worthwhile Wear's mission…
Worthwhile Wear exists to rescue and restore girls from forced prostitution, and more importantly help prevent girls from ever entering it. We target highly trafficked areas both internationally and domestically, and offer women the opportunity to overcome two primary factors which are at the root of sex trafficking; poverty and lack of education. This solution is offered through vocational training centers which teach women how to make wears, such as jewelry, handbags, and clothing, which are sold to provide them employment. Additionally, the women are offered free education, a safe place to stay, and restorative programs geared toward encouraging personal growth and re-establishing self-worth.

We had the honor of working on the planning committee and doing all the decor and design for Worthwhile Wear's launch in 2012. The following images and statistics were used as artwork at the launch benefit-A Worthwhile Evening.

Those beautiful faces are not stock images. They're from Dan's last trip to India a few months back. The work Worthwhile wear is doing is critical and we hope you'll check out their site and follow along with them on Facebook.
Now it's Time to Vote!
There are 8 bloggers in this competition and some of them have a lot of followers, but none have the amazing fans we do! We know you guys have our back!
All voting will be done via Homes.com's Facebook Page
(On their Facebook Page, there's a little button that says Crafting for Charity. Click there)

Click HERE to Vote

A HUGE Thank You to Homes.com for sponsoring this awesome contest and for spreading the word about amazing charities like Worthwhile Wear. If you'd like more information about the organization and how you can help, click here.

Thanks so much!
Now, Go Get Your Vote On!

A while ago we talked all about our decorating plans for the event, A Worthwhile Evening, benefitting our friend's non-profit organization, Worthwhile Wear. We even shared some mood boards, but wanted to show you how it actually turned out!

We'll be completely honest. We didn't think we could pull it off. Especially because this is the room we had to overhaul into a beautiful setting for 200 people with only a $300 budget.

Oh boy. We were scared. But guess what? We pulled it off and the night went so well, and the room looked beautiful. We used all of our sneaky resources and came up with some inexpensive, but pretty awesome decor for the room. The Centerpieces

These babies were definitely our favorite feature of the room. We used chargers and vases from the Dollar Store, branches from our backyards that we spraypainted gold, and flowers from Produce Junction. But what really made them shine was the Worthwhile Wear jewelry we hung from the branches. They looked so cool, made a great conversation piece and helped to sell even more jewelry for the organization,

The tables were covered in an inexpensive purple satin with a gold, shimmery tulle overlay. 

The Art

We used the same roofing material that we used on our last Nate Show episode and the Indian Paisley Damask stencil from Royal Design Studios to create a gorgeous backdrop for the room. A big thank you to Royal Design Studios for donating the stencil for a good cause! We've said it time and time again that stencils make a huge impact for very little cost, and RDS stencil are the BEST!

The Silent Auction Tables Unfortunately, the room had a pretty ugly border around the entire room that would have been too expensive to cover up, not to mention pretty difficult to do in a non-permanent way. We decided to use one of our other tricks, giant Staples Engineer Prints to deck out the walls and draw the eye away from the border. The prints of these gorgeous girls and women were taken while Dan was in India learning more about the culture and the great need for these girls to be rescued. Printed on each picture was a statistic of interest (most of them heart-breaking) related to human trafficking.

The Atmosphere

We were pretty limited as far as furniture goes to just what the church had available, so we decided to make the whole room into a lounge/coffee shop feel. Lots of cozy seating areas, coffee tables and lamps for softer lighting. We also used a lot of Ikea curtain panels to dress up the walls a bit more. 

Of course, Viswas, the sitar player, need a cool background! 

One big score was the lights we had hanging from the ceiling. The church already owned this (which helped us stay within budget), but they originally came from Ikea.

A big thank you to the photographers for the evening, Jake of Harr Photography and Robert of Robert Radu Stern for sharing their pictures with us. They even snagged a great one of the two of us at the end of the night!

We were so happy with the way the evening went, and that we could use our talents to help out our good buddies, Dan and Steph and the amazing organization they've started. Want to know how you can help us help them out even more? Worthwhile Wear is a part of two awesome contests and need our votes. It only takes a minute, but will make a big difference!

1. The First ever Philadelphia DoGooder Awards celebrates the power of storytelling as a way to connect non profit organizations with valuable partners, volunteers, donors and resources. Non profits are invited to submit short 5 minute or less (2-3 preferred) films with a compelling narrative. Filmmakers are encourage to submit films on behalf of their non profit clients. They are competing for $250,000 in resources, national and regional recognition, and much much more. To vote, click here, watch the video (be prepared for tears!), and cast your vote.

2. Our local bank, Univest, is giving $5,000 to a local non-profit. They are asking you, the community, to nominate a non-profit for this contribution. Please take a moment to"Like" Univest and then in the comment section write a nomination f or Worthwhile Wear. You can nominate WW until 12/31/12. Feel free to share this with others. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is the perfect season to do a little good for someone else. We thank you so much for helping us grow Worthwhile Wear! Have an awesome, Christmas-festivity-filled weekend!

These are our good friends, Dan and Steph:

They are always good for a laugh, strange health-food items and a helping hand. Not only that, they have really big hearts. Recently, they decided to start a non-profit organization to help rescue young women from human trafficking. It's called Worthwhile Wear. Here's what Dan and Steph have to say about it:

Worthwhile Wear exists to rescue and restore girls from forced prostitution, and more importantly help prevent girls from ever entering it. We target highly trafficked areas both internationally and domestically, and offer women the opportunity to overcome two primary factors which are at the root of sex trafficking; poverty and lack of education. This solution is offered through vocational training centers which teach women how to make wears, such as jewelry, handbags, and clothing, which are sold to provide them employment. Additionally, the women are offered free education, a safe place to stay, and restorative programs geared toward encouraging personal growth and re-establishing self-worth.

A big part of their mission is to provide items that these women produce, to us, here in the States. The women are given a fair wage (30-40% higher than the average paid person in their area) so that they can protect themselves from ever having to go back to their old lives. And the stuff is gorgeous!

But here's where we come in: Dan and Steph and the board of Worthwhile Wear are hosting a huge kick-off party for their new organization on November 17th at Calvary Church in Souderton at 7 PM and they've asked us to decorate. Yee-haw! Using our talents and what we love to do to help others is our idea of a good time (we like to call it a"Helping Hobby"). The theme of the night is"Celebrating the Richness of India", and we can't wait to try out some fun ideas.

We're planning on incorporating this Indian Paisley Damask Stencil from Royal Design Studio in some fabric wall treatments, and possibly some art.

We, of course, want to include the rich, vibrant colors of India like you see in this Inspiration Mood Board from Limn & Lovely. Don't those colors knock your socks off?!

Did you know marigolds are one of India's national flowers? Were going to try and get our hands on some for a splash of color on the tables and around the room. This Inspiration Mood Board from Marigold Events inspired us to add in some fun yellow and orange tones!

Here's where YOU come in:
We are hosting a table of 10 at the event and want YOU to join us! Wouldn't it be so fun to hang out with fellow blog junkies, while supporting an amazing cause and experiencing the culture of India? Tickets and more information can be found here. Make sure you let us know that you'll be there, so that we can be sure to save a spot for you. Hurry to buy your tickets!

 If you can't make the event, then go ahead and start your Christmas shopping on their website! Don't want to come to the event or shop, but still want to help? Donate here to help save young girls and give them the hope for a future. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We are so excited about Worthwhile Wear, and so proud of our friends, Steph and Dan! We hope to see you at A Worthwhile Evening in a few weeks!

If you didn't hear our BIG announcement, stop reading right now and take a look here. We are excited beyond words and are so grateful for your support and encouragement! And to think…it all started right here!: ) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Remember that little contest we were a part of a couple weeks ago? It was a great contest run by Homes.com for an awesome cause- creating projects for a chance to win $5000 for your favorite charity. Well, sadly, we didn't win, but, we're pretty thrilled with our entry and wanted to share this super happy space with you guys.Let's get on with the project shall we?
I (Monica) have had this project in my mind for a few months now. It was inspired by a printed pattern I had seen in the window of a shop. I couldn't remember exactly where I saw it, but I was pretty sure it was a cool shop we had passed when we were in London in November. Great story right? Crafty DIY project inspired by a European city… Then, two weeks ago it hit me… It was JCrew at our local mall! I just about died laughing when I put it all together! Well, JCrew or London, I sure am glad it inspired me…
For under $20 we created DIY Wood Shim Wall Art

I wanted something with BOLD color, and a modern feel, that married well with a bit of industrial flare!

How's that for a Before and After?
Who knew our dumpy oak piano could be such a show stopper? (You can read all about that little makeover right here. )

Here's a peek at the details- the DIY light isn't my entry, but man I love how it works with the Wood Shim Art!

Even though it looks pretty complex, the process was super simple and the longest part of the process was waiting for the paint to dry. Here's how we did it: #1- Purchase Long Wood Shims

We bought 5 packs of these from Lowes for $3.84 each. They sell two sizes, so make sure you go with the longer of the two 11 7/8" (yellow package).
#2- Cut the ends at a 45 degree angle. I used my miter saw and cut each piece- I started with one at a time, then did a little math in my head, noticed it would take an eternity, and then started cutting five at a time. Worked like a charm!

#3- Paint Your Shims I created a little spray paint zone in my basement and used all my leftover spray paint colors. When you're painting, just make sure that you put half with the angle to the left and half with the angle to the right or you'll be stuck with one sided arrows!

After they had dried I was left with this awesome assortment of color!! I used about 13 different colors, but I also think doing the whole project in various shades of one color could look pretty epic too!

#4- Make (or use) a Plumb Line Once we decided where we wanted our center point, we needed to get a straight vertical line to follow.

We took a nail, some bakers twine, and a socket to DIY a little old plumbline. Nail it in and voila!

#5- String Line your Vertical I love my string line… seriously, I use it all the time! We put it at our top and bottom marks (created using our plumb line) and then snapped that baby to give us a guide line.

#6 Determine your Pattern This step saved us major time. Use the floor to get your layout right and then installing it on the wall is a breeze. We wanted our pattern random and we wanted varying lengths and heights.

#7- Glue it on the Wall Rather than using 300 tiny nails (that could very easily splinter the shims) we opted for Gorilla Wood Glue. It was simple to use, will hold securely, and won't damage my walls completely (the way liquid nails would).

Following our pattern, Jess glued and I placed the arrows. Shims are very imperfect, so I had to be okay with tiny gaps and just kept using the center line to keep things straight.

Even before it was finished, we knew we were obsessed with it!

We finished it off with some fun accessories and the coolest light fixture ever, and called it a day.

There were a lot of DIY elements around our Crafting for Charity project, so to find out details about other projects, you can check 'em out below., We'll be posting more about them in the next few weeks, so just hold tight.: )

Even though we didn't win, we hope you'll still check out Worthwhile Wear, which was founded by our close friends Dan & Steph. They've committed their time and talents to make it their life's work.

Jess and I both have daughters and we couldn't imagine any of them having to endure human trafficking. We love Worthwhile Wear's mission…
Worthwhile Wear exists to rescue and restore girls from forced prostitution, and more importantly help prevent girls from ever entering it. We target highly trafficked areas both internationally and domestically, and offer women the opportunity to overcome two primary factors which are at the root of sex trafficking; poverty and lack of education. This solution is offered through vocational training centers which teach women how to make wears, such as jewelry, handbags, and clothing, which are sold to provide them employment. Additionally, the women are offered free education, a safe place to stay, and restorative programs geared toward encouraging personal growth and re-establishing self-worth.

That beautiful face is not a stock image. They're from Dan's last trip to India a few months back. The work Worthwhile wear is doing is critical and we hope you'll check out their site and follow along with them on Facebook.
What do you thinkj? Could you paint a piano green? Or glue shims to your wall?

Can you believe it's Monday already? I (Monica) had an awesome weekend with lots of family time and a whole day with my BFF as well! Today we have a special guest that we're super excited about, but first let me tell you about an event you should attend tonight!

Jess and I will be at the Chick-Fil-A in Quakertown Monday night supporting an amazing cause. Our friends are starting a ministry called Worthwhile Wear and its mission to to stop human trafficking and free girls from the sex slave trade. We'll be sharing all about this ministry on the blog soon, but for now, we'd love for you to join us at Chick-Fil-A Monday night anywhere from 5-7pm. Just let the cashier know you'd like to support Worthwhile Wear and 15% of your sale will go to the ministry.
We'd love to see a whole bunch of EC2 readers come out!
Monday, September 17th 5-7pm
Chick-Fil-A Quakertown PA
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Now, onto our awesome guest for today. Erika is part of the Dating Divas team. We've been huge fans for ages… Before Jess and I even considered starting a blog, we visited theirs to get awesome date night ideas. If you haven't checked it out before, you really should. Being a married gal isn't always a cake walk and they have so many ideas that can help bring you and your hubs closer together. We're truly honored to have Erika here today! Take it away…
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I'm so excited to be here at East Coast Creative sharing a fun family idea with you. I found this amazing site while I was browsing Pinterest for a fun Valentines idea and came across their Game of Love. So much fun! After seeing that post, I was hooked. I'm Erika and I'm one of the gals visiting today from The Dating Divas. We are a group of gals sharing ideas to strengthen marriages. Each week we share creative date ideas, marriage tips, quick and easy romance ideas, and SO much more. Often times we have everything ready for you, all you have to do is print off the free printables and go on the date.

Today, let's talk about some HOT TOPICS!

Today I want to share with you a fun family idea Corie came up with. We all cherish the time we spend eating dinner with our family each night. It is a great opportunity to sit, eat, and talk with your kids and husband. One night a week, you pull out a box of"Hot Topics." Pass the box around and each person takes out several questions. As you eat dinner, ask each other these unusual, fun, or interesting questions. You'll never believe that dinner could be SO MUCH FUN. Pick a night to pull out the box each week, and soon you'll have a fun family tradition to look forward to each week. You'll need to add to the questions each month (to keep them going,) but I have included a list to get your family started! These 15 questions will be the perfect start to the"Hot Topics" discussion at your dinner table. Your"Hot Topic" box can be made out of anything you have in your house. It is super easy and can be pulled together in a matter of minutes. Let me show you how… To make your"Hot Topic" box…

1. Find a box.
2. Decorate the box with scrapbook paper.
3. Download the"Hot Topic" list and cut out each question and place in the box.

4. Bring your box to dinner and start passing out the questions. To download your list of"Hot Topics" head over to our site and print away. What family traditions does your family enjoy during dinner? Thanks again for having me!
-Erika

We could not wait to get our hands on this white-walled, lackluster master bedroom! We had a blast transforming it into a colorful and fun room that was full of personality and matched the homeowners enthusiasm and zest for life! After thoroughly scaring Steph and Dan with our choice of tangerine orange paint for the walls, we showed them how a little bit of color can go a long way in creating an awesome room!

Meet Steph and Dan. They're super fun, young, outgoing, goofy and not-to-mention, pretty darn good-looking!

In two days, we took their blah bedroom from this:

to this!

Pretty crazy, right? We DIYed our way through this entire room and even upcycled some of their old furniture into amazing, modern pieces! Plus, we were so happy to incorporate the gorgeous jewelry that their non-profit Worthwhile Wear creates to help rescue women from sex trafficking in a quirky wall display.

You can check out all our fun projects for this room right here.

If you missed the episode, you can check it out here. We hope you love it as much as we loved putting it all together!

Okay, so we weren't really"gone, gone," just kind of in overdrive and really, really swamped with about 1000 things going on at once. The good news is that even if we weren't technically"gone"… we're BAAACK (just like Twinkies!)

Yesterday we finished up seven straight weeks of filming for Knock It Off with only one week off during that time. Yeah, it kicked our butts! Our schedule won't always be like that, but we wanted Jess to be able to take a nice long maternity leave break, so we did tons of episodes close together.
This is how we looked at the beginning of our 7 weeks…

And this is how we looked at the end!

Okay, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but not by much!: )
We're off for the next 20 days (woo-freakin'-hoo!!!) then we have one more episode to film, and then we have a long baby break! Here's a little peek into some of the fun things we have planned and what you can expect the next few months here at EC2!

For the first two years of our blog we posted 5 times a week and were the queens of consistency. Throw a TV show into the mix and it messed with our game! Our goal is to get back to 4 solid posts a week. We actually have SO many things we're excited to post about- including Jess' baby nursery (coming soon!!)

Remember how we hosted the biggest DIY contest in blog land- Creating with the Stars?? Well, believe it or not- we're already in the planning stages for our 2014 season! We don't want to tell you all the details yet, but we're going to have a fun fall/winter series that will win one lucky blogger a coveted spot in the 2014 season of CWTS!

Not only will we be blogging more, we're super excited about having some time to work on fun projects in our own homes! We've done 14 complete room makeovers in the last few months (which equals about 150+ projects) and we're so ready to DIY in our own homes for a bit! We'll also be sure to keep on posting all the KIO tutorials for projects we've done for the show!

Tomorrow night we're honored to be the guests at a Ladies Night Out event raising money for Worthwhile Wear. In 90 minutes we'll be completely transforming a blah, ho-hum room and doing it in front of 450 people! DIYing on TV is one thing, but doing it live and hoping every project turns out as planned and that everything can be completed during the 30 minute intermission just might be crazy town! We're honestly so excited about the challenge and we're looking forward to challenging the women there to use what they've got in their homes and also in relation to the gifts God has given them.
We'll be sure to have tons of pics taken and we'll share the projects on the blog next week! Here's a hint… think cheetah print, ikat, and teal! So, that's what we've got in store for the blog! We're excited to share all of this with you guys!! Do you have any special requests for us over the next few months?

Oh man, we love a good giveaway. I mean, really, who doesn't like to win free things?! We've talked about our friend Stacy multiple times because we can't get enough of her photography. Just recently Salvatori Photography did an awesome story session of Monica and her family. Basically, she followed their family around one Saturday morning to capture their everyday moments and they turned out fabulous…
(This is one of Monica's favorites from the session)

Last year, she captured our entire families and as a result, we have photos we will love for a lifetime.

One of her photos even graces my walls in an almost life-sized way- remember my huge shaped frame? And this picture of my kiddos (they were so little!) is just priceless.

And, well, it's pretty nice to have a great photo of me and my best friend.

For Mother's Day, we are so excited to be able to give away a photography session with Salvatori Photography!

Here are the prize details you need to know:

~ 1 hour Session in one location ~ Up to 5 people ~ Over a $300 Value ~ Must live within 25 miles of Perkasie PA ~ Can't not be redeemed for cash value -Must be redeemed by August 1, 2013
Isn't this AWESOME?!! Just think, one of you could surprise your mom, sister, grandma or wife with a photography session for Mother's Day! I would be over the moon with a gift like that (*hint hint, hubby!).
**Please make sure you click to LIKE Salvatori Photography- don't just click I'm a fan, unless you already are. Thanks!**
a Rafflecopter giveaway

We'll announce the lucky winner next Friday, April 19th! Good luck!: )

P.S, We're the ones in a contest now and if we win, we get to give $5000 to a charity we love- Worthwhile Wear. We need your help, though- you can learn more about our project and the charity we chose here, or go vote for us every day for the next two weeks right here. Thanks!!

Before we get into today's post, we wanted to take a minute to stop and express our extreme sadness over what happened in Sandy Hook Elementary School on Friday. We know that the Lord is close to the brokenhearted, and we pray that that is true for every person affected by this tragedy. Please keep those sweet children and their families in your prayers as you go through this holiday season and beyond. If you'd like to help in some way, you can donate here. Psalm 34:18 The Lord is close

to the brokenhearted

and saves those who are crushed in spirit. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A few weeks ago we filled you in on one of our most-anticipated holiday traditions: a Favorite Things Party (we even explained what we do in a fun video which revealed that we really are dorks). To make it even easier for you to host your own, I created this adorable chalkboard-inspired printable invitation.

Well, because our girlfriends have such great taste, a recap of all the gifts is in order, don't you think?! You know Monica and I can't resist creating pretty things, and our gift packaging was no exception. Let's take a peek: Monica's Gift 

Monica used the fun wrapping accessories she talked about here. Each girl got a mason jar of"Melted North Pole Snow" and a striped paper bag with a super cute wood tag. I'm not going to tell you what her gift was yet, because she's going to show you later this week. It's a good one, friends. Definitely worth the wait.: ) Jessica's Gift

I wrapped my gifts using paper from Target (is there any other store?!), gray and white bakers twine and little paper tags that I hand-stamped with my mini alphabet stamps. Lest you think they were perfect, take a look at Monica's tag.

Haha. Oops, ran out of space, and then the dog licked the tag and smeared it.: ) Our Girlfriend's Gifts 

Before we open any gifts, we go around and guess what we think each girl brought. It's fun to see how well you know each other. It turns out that I don't know them very well I'm a bad guesser. Without further ado, here is our list of favorite things from our closest gal pals to you! 

1. Our most stylish friend, Jane (sorry everyone else!) brought homemade Candy Cane Sugar Scrub. I don't what recipe she used, but I found a recipe you can make for yourself here. She also gave us Eos Lip Balm, which is fabulous if you've never tried it. 2. My gift was so random. It included Brownie mix, because I'm obsessed with the batter. True story: I bought 6 boxes (one for each girl), but the night before the party I got hungry for brownie batter and used one of the boxes. My poor sister got jipped that night, but I made sure to buy another box for her later! Good thing she loves me anyway.;) I also gave Maybelline Illegal Length Mascara which I shared my love for back here. I totally dig that stuff. 3. My sister Chrissie's most favorite thing is getting a large Diet Coke from MacDonald's whenever she can, so we all got a gift card to Mickey D's, along with her favorite candy: Reese's. Her gift wins as most unhealthy, but also the most yummy!

4. Lindsey, our tell-it-like-it-is-friend (which we love, by the way!) gave us some pretty pink lace undies from Aerie and her most-used spice: Tony Chachare's Creole Seasoning. She promised us she'd give us her famous jambalaya recipe, as well. (I haven't forgotten, Lindsey! I'm coming after that recipe!) 5. Steph, our socially-conscious, health food-nut friend, (remember last year? She gave us Spelt flour. Hilarious) gave us her favorite bag from Worthwhile Wear, the company she and her husband started to help save women from human trafficking. Most meaningful gift for sure, but super cute and functional, too! 6. Jane, the sweet, sensitive and ultra-caring book junkie, gave us an Amazon gift card in a handmade card, which just made my day. I love downloading books to my kindle, and now I can do it without feeling guilty! 7. (Or 8, if you look at my picture above. I clearly can't count correctly) was Monica's gift, but like I said, you'll just have to wait to see that one!

Sadly, we didn't get a group shot of the seven of us, even after I made an announcement that no one could leave until we had done so. That's two years and counting that we have more pics of the presents, than of our friends. Boo for us. There's always next year, I guess!: ) So, if you came to our party, what would YOU bring?