Around The Clock Bridal Shower

My mom and I hosted an "Around the Clock" bridal shower for my cousin's fiancée. This shower tended to be a little more difficult since the shower was in Indiana and we live in Tennessee. 

I think everything came together very nicely in the end.

The basic premise of the around the clock shower is that each guest is assigned a time of day or a theme that they are responsible for. Each time is a jumping off point to be creative and design the shower gift around it. Here is the list of times that I picked from for this particular shower:

Game....Tool.....Sushi....Kitchen

Dessert.....Holiday.....Baking.....Bed

Breakfast.....Potluck....BBQ....Picnic

Reading.....Bath.....Tea.....Nap

TV....Beach.....Garden

Disney (they are getting married at Disney World)

Here is what I made for the bride to be...mine was "dessert time." I went with a trifle theme.

I made several recipe cards that had various trifle recipes, added some kitchen towels/pot holders that she actually registered for, a big trifle bowl and 4 mini-trifle bowls.

I actually etched the trifle bowl with her new last name.

Here is one of the mini trifle bowls that I etched with their initial.

Another guest had holiday time. She got inventive and gave a holiday craft book, cookie cutters for Easter, Halloween, Christmas and a package of very cute tea towels for each holiday.

Our welcoming table designed to look like a clock.

We asked the guests to bring a favorite recipe to share with the bride to be.
We got a nice binder for the recipes for them.

I made a guest book/gift book for the bride to use at our shower and future showers.

We opted for a dessert bar for the food choices.

We made fruit salsa and served it with "brownie brittle" we found at the store and cinnamon pita chips.

My cousin and his fiancée are getting married at Disney World (in the Japanese Gardens at Epcot). Due to their affinity for the Japanese culture, I made some dessert sushi to add a little fun to the table. The ladies weren't too sure about eating sushi at a bridal shower. I had to assure them that they were only made of rice krispie treats and candy. I took that as a good sign that they thought it looked real. 

Up close view of the sushi. I used laffy taffy and swedish fish on the "sashimi" and some white icing and orange sugar sprinkles on the rolls. I rolled the outside in crushed chocolate graham crackers. 

I made strawberry lemon trifles in cute little shot glasses and tiny spoons.

What's a shower without cupcakes?

Spumoni cupcakes...the cupcake is half cherry and half pistachio topped
with chocolate icing and a cherry on top.

QR Code Picture Frame

The other day I was surfing Pinterest and I ran across this cute Valentine's Day card. Immediately I thought....I can do something like that. This is what I came up with....something that can sit on my husband's desk at work and him know we are thinking about him. You see, my husband is very much a tech guy. He could really care less if I make him some kind of frilly love note declaring 366 reasons why I love him (believe me, I only recently came to this realization). I thought this might be more suited to him and his love for technology---and the fact it is a little bit on the geeky side.

I started to do a little research because honestly, I'm not a techie in comparison to my husband. The first search was how do I make one of the QR Codes by myself. Let me tell you, Google is a wonderful tool! I'm sure there are many great QR Code generating websites out there, this happens to be the one I found first and it was user friendly enough for this girl that doesn't know enough about computers and tech stuff. I went to quirfy to generate my own code. Below are a couple screen prints showing how easy this process really is!

Step one, type in the message you want to display with the QR Code.

Once you hit "qurify," the code is displayed to the right. You have the option to print the
code from there or save it as a file. I chose to save the file that way I could resize it if I wanted to.

I resized the image (careful to keep it a square).
This resizing was perfect for an 8x10 frame.

Here is the code itself. So easy!! I know there are other programs where you can link a photo to the code.
I plan on playing around with that some in the future too. If you have a scanner on your phone,
just scan this box and you will be able to see the "secret" message!

To be able to scan the code, you need an app to do it. ScanLife is the one I happen to
have on my phone that I use for other codes I come across. Again, I think there are
SEVERAL out there to pick and choose from.

I just cut a piece of card stock to fit into a 5x7 frame and cut out the
QR Code to attach to the card stock.

Here's the finished product. Here in an 8x10 frame.

Here in an 8x10 and 5x7.

My son scanning the code to see if it really works.

It does work! It says "We love you and hope you are having a wonderful day!"

I think the next version(s) of this will have pictures and codes meshed together to make it even more meaningful. What a fun and pretty unique gift to make/receive! Have fun playing around! The possibilities are endless!