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The Alpha and The Omega – Kutless For Christmas

November 24, 2017 by Ashley Leave a Comment

This is a sponsored post. I was compensated with the Kutless CD in exchange for my honest opinion.

I don’t talk about religion very often or really at all here on my blog because I will admit I am not the most religious person and I have my own way of living life. I do however also honor my family and love supporting them. I have a family that is very religious and love to show it in all aspects of their life and that is why I am sharing this with you today.

Kutless – Alpha/Omega

Quite a few years back my home church began a Saturday night contemporary church service and as a teen this was my service of choice. Going to this service grew a love for Christian rock music. My family began to listen to Rock/Gospel music on a regular basis and Kutless is one of those great Rock Gospel bands out there. They stand behind their beliefs and do everything they can to pay it forward and offer free concerts around the world to help spread the word and the love.

Kutless Alpha/Omega CD

While I am not an avid Christian music listener I will admit that Kutless has a really nice rock feel to their music that I do enjoy. So I you are a lover of rock music you should really enjoy the sound of their music. This new CD makes for a great small Christmas gift or a great stocking stuffer gift for someone in your family as well.

Why Kutless stands out from the crowd.

Kutless stands out from the crowd because you don’t find many bands that are willing to do what they do. They created the EOTA Ministries back in 2012 to help expand their outreach around the globe. The EOTA is a no -profit organization that makes it possible for Kutless to host large, free outreach concerts and events around the world.

Kutless Alpha/Omega CD

Where to buy!

You can buy Kutless’ new CD Alpha/Omega online at a variety of different retailers. The album is available for download in the iTunes Store or you can purchase the CD or individual songs from Amazon. I will admit that my store of choice is almost always Amazon because that’s where I do most of my shopping.

Filed Under: Featured Tagged With: CD, Christian, music

DIY Music Themed Birthday Party Decorations And Snacks

March 15, 2017 by Ashley Leave a Comment

Throwing a birthday party can easily get really expensive.  I made sure that I tried my hardest to stretch every dollar I spent because we had between 30-50 people at Raiden’s first birthday and we needed to provide appetizers, dinner, and cake for all of these people.  Even with us making a majority of it the money just kept flying out the window.  That is why I decided to not buy the expensive music themed birthday party decorations and instead made them myself at home.

They were a huge hit and everyone was asking me how I made them so I thought I would share with you how I made the various different birthday party decorations for Raiden’s first birthday party.

DIY Music Themed Birthday Party Decorations

DIY Record Platter

Supplies Needed:

  • Record
  • Candle Holder
  • Hot Glue Gun and Glue

* Supplies listed are for one Record Platter; if you want to make multiple platters you will want to get more records and candle holders.

Step 1:

If you don’t have these items in your home I recommend going to your local thrift store and/or dollar store to find the items.  I found “candle holders” from Dollar Tree that worked perfectly.  They were the ones that hold the candle on the bottom and your put the scent oils on the top.  I loved that they had a bigger surface area so that the record had more stability.  Once you have them home you will want to wash them so that they are clean before you begin crafting.

*I didn’t take the paper off of the center of the record, but I believe that you will have better results if you do this.

Step 2:

Get your hot glue gun ready.  You will need to be fast so I recommend you have someone help you with this step.  You are going to put glue along the rim of the candle holder and place the record centered on it so that it is glued in place.  You can use a different glue if you want, but this worked real well and was real fast to do.  Now, I had the paper still on the records and noticed that they can easily come apart if they are jostled too much because the glue is adhering to the paper not the record.  I plan to attempt to redo them without the paper, but have not had the chance.  They did hold up through the entire party.

Step 3:

Clean the record with a soapy cloth or wipe so that it is extra clean when you place food atop them.  You wouldn’t want to put food on something dirty.

DIY Music Snack Bowls

Supplies Needed:

  • Snack Cups (Bought at Dollar Tree for $1)
  • Permanent Marker(s)

Step 1:

I went to the Dollar store and bought their snack cups in the party section.  They came in packs of 8.  I was able to find black and red cups, but our stores were out of white ones.  You will want to pick out whatever colors go with the color scheme of your party and you will want to buy permanent markers as well.  I needed silver and black markers for the red and black cups.  I was able to get these at the Dollar Tree as well, but I know that not all stores have the same products so you may need to buy them elsewhere.

Step 2:

Set aside some time because this is time consuming.  In order to make these DIY music snack bowls you will need to be patient while you had draw music notes onto your cups.  You can choose to draw big or small notes.  We drew half big notes and half small notes to change it up a little bit.  I sat and watched a movie while I drew on the music notes.  It really helped to make it feel like it wasn’t taking as long as it really was taking.

birthday party decorations

DIY Snack Boxes

Supplies Needed:

  • Snack Boxes (I bought boxes like these from a local shop)
  • Marker
  • Construction paper
  • Straight Edge
  • Glue Stick

There aren’t really steps for this craft.  Once you have your boxes you will want to cut out half dollar sized circles for each box.  You will need two circles per box.  Once the circles are cut out you will want to glue them onto the box.  When you glue them you can put one slightly higher than the other so it looks like they are different notes or you can keep them level.  That is up to you.  Once they are glued on you will then use a straight edge to draw the lines of the music note.  It really isn’t very hard or all that time consuming.  We only did a note on the front of the box, but you can do it on multiple sides if you so chose.

birthday party decorations

DIY Microphone Cupcakes

Supplies Needed:

  • Cupcake Pan
  • Tin Cake Pan (rectangular)
  • Cake Mix (we did yellow cake)
  • Ice cream cones (if you can find them the colored ones are awesome)
  • White Frosting
  • Silver Sprinkles

*I found this cupcake pan made for making cupcakes in ice cream cones after the party, but if you think you will make them more than once you might want to invest in this pan.

Step 1:

Make the cupcake batter as directed on the box and set aside.  If you did not buy the pan I found on Amazon then you will need to get crafty.  I cut out circles for the cones out of the tin cake pan and placed it upside down on the cookie sheet and places the cones in the holes.  Once you have them set up you will portion out the batter.  You will want to fill them like you do a regular cupcake pan.  Only fill them around half way because if you over fill them they will make a huge mess and not turn out how you want.

Step 2:

Let the cupcakes cool before you begin frosting them.  You will want to spread the frosting on nice and evenly.  If you are really good you can pipe the frosting on to make them look rounder like a microphone.  (My hands are too shaky and weak that I struggle with piping bags.)  Once you have put the frosting on you will want to use your silver sprinkles.  You can use any kind.  We used a fine sprinkle and a little silver food dye spray on each cupcake and everyone seemed to love how they looked.

And there you have it! Once all of these birthday party decorations were made I felt like I good take a sigh of relief and know that everyone would be able to tell the theme of the party.  In addition to the birthday party decorations listed above we did also make bowls out of records, but that is a post for later. (My hubby wants to write all about it because he is so proud of his bowls.)

If you are looking for more ideas for a music themed party then you should check out my post on a DIY Music Themed Birthday Banner and DIY Music Themed Highchair Banner for a first birthday party.

If you have any ideas on other music themed party decorations please let me know because I would love to try them as well!

 

Filed Under: Activities & Crafts, DIY, Featured Tagged With: Birthday Party, CRafts, Decorations, DIY, music

Streaming Music Seamlessly With Google Chromecast Audio

March 11, 2017 by Ashley Leave a Comment

The reviewer has been compensated in the form of a Best Buy Gift Card and/or received the Chromecast Audio device at a reduced price or for free.

chromecast audio

As a child boomboxes and stereos were all the rage!  We had cassette tapes and CD’s that we would play in these devices and it was wonderful, but as technology has progressed we have steered away from physical media devices and now stream digital media and it has caused us to have no real use for our stereos because we couldn’t play our digital media on them.  The media isn’t on a CD or cassette tape so how would we make it possible to play music from these systems?  All of our stereo’s were collecting dust until I got the Google Chromecast Audio device in the mail.  If you haven’t heard of this device (I hadn’t until a couple of months ago) then stay and keep reading because this might be a game changer for you.

Now, I know I said that my stereo’s had been collecting dust and this had been happening because we have been buying our music digitally from Amazon or iTunes for quite some time.  We weren’t going to bother with burning our own CD’s (honestly only one of our computers even has a CD drive in it) so they have just been sitting in storage.  During this time we have used Bluetooth speakers to stream music from our phones, but god is that annoying.  When you stream music using a Bluetooth device you end up hearing EVERYTHING that happens on the device.  This means everyone has to hear the notifications from your phone and have them interrupt the music you are listening to.

Not Bluetooth Enabled; WiFi Enabled

The Google Chromecast Audio device is different because it does not use Bluetooth instead it uses your local WiFi and the Chromecast app on your phone, tablet, or computer.  This means that it is streaming the content specifically from one application.  If you have used the Chromecast app for the TV then you will have an idea of what I am talking about.  This device is quite different from that one because it does not plug in using HDMI or anything like that; instead this device plugs into your speaker or stereo’s auxiliary input.

Streaming from this device is really easy you just need to install the Google Home app onto your Android or Apple device.  Once you have the app installed you will plug in your Chromecast Audio and go through the setup process on the app.  We had a little bit of trouble getting ours set up due to our WiFi.  We fixed the problem though I can’t really tell you what we did because I don’t understand how we fixed it, haha.  After setting up the device you can open any compatible audio device and cast it to the device.

google chromecast audioSome examples of apps that are compatible are:
  • Spotify
  • iHeartRadio
  • Pandora internet radio
  • YouTube
  • Google Play Music
  • NPR

These are just a few of the different apps that you can stream from.  If you are looking to learn what other apps can be used you can go to: chromecast.com/apps.

Since we have been using the Chromecast Audio device I have noticed that we have music playing in the background more often than we had before because it is so much easier to play music.  I love it because I can play music that we enjoy or change it up and put on educational kids music for my son when he is playing with his toys.  He just loves music and seeing the smile on his face when it is playing melts my heart.  I have also noticed that the music is much cleaner and crisper sounding than I ever get from my phone, tablet, or Bluetooth enabled device.

Would your family benefit from the Chromecast Audio device?

If you decide to go hunt out down I highly recommend shopping at Best Buy because they offer great service and also have some really great protection plans that you can purchase to help protect the Chromecast Audio device(s) that you buy.

Filed Under: Featured, Home & Decor, Review Tagged With: bestbuy, chromecast, music, Review

Following the “Melody Road” with Neil Diamond a Review

October 24, 2014 by Ashley Leave a Comment

Neil Diamond to many is a classic musical artist. Not in the way that he plays or performs classical music, but in a way that he is someone that is classified often as “old school music” or just music of the past that is still popular. Maybe there is no real name for what he is, but you will often hear him played on “Oldies” radio stations.

He just released his newest album Melody Road on October 21st.  This is a huge success and all of his fans have been waiting a long while for a new album release.  This particular wait has lasted the last six years.  One of the features that makes his album stand out is the fact that each physical copy purchased comes with a special 36-page lyric book that includes guitar tabs to the songs.  Unfortunately, I am unable to show you what this book looks like due to the fact that I was only able to review a digital copy of the album.  (This is not a bad thing, as I am more than excited to have been able to review his album prior to its release in stores.

His music like always is something that most everyone will enjoy listening to.  The clear tones, and soothing sound of his vocals are always a pleasure and his newest music does not fail to meet the high standards that all of his other albums raised.  You can purchase his album on both iTunes and Amazon where you can also sample his newest songs on this album.

Normally my favorite songs on an album are not the singer songwriter’s singles, but that is not the case with this album. I am just completely in love with Neil Diamond’s songs Blue Something and Art of Love off of his new album Melody Road.  Both of these songs already have videos on his Vevo YouTube channel.

Are you a Neil Diamond fan?

Filed Under: Featured, Review Tagged With: iTunes, music, Review

Music – Heart and Soul

December 9, 2013 by Ashley Leave a Comment

Music is the universal language of mankind.

-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Outre-Mer

Music is the beauty in life that many don’t see.  It is everywhere you look.  You just need to take a moment and pause.  Let the world slow down and hear the music in everything you do.  Music is the epitome of life.  It reverberates through life; it is the essence of life.  It lives within your soul, deep inside you.

Listening silently you can hear the music in your heartbeat and every breath you take.  If that isn’t enough listen harder to the wind outside or the rainfall hitting the roof above your head.  Do you hear it now?  How about listening to the silence, the rustle of the leaves in the trees or the sounds of crickets on a cool summer’s eve.

musicDo you hear it now?

Every key I hit in rapid succession as I type – it’s music to my ears.  The music of my life.  The music of my soul.  Can you hear the music around you? Let thee music take over.  Hear it where you think it wouldn’t be possible.

The pleasure we obtain from music comes from counting, but counting unconsciously. Music is nothing but unconscious arithmetic.

-Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz

Gottfried explained so much in two simple sentences.  Music is based off of rhythm and beats and when broken down it is just numbers all pieced together to make something beautiful.

SONY DSCAdding. Subtracting. Multiplying. Dividing.

Each of these are done within a piece of music and with out them the song would be incomplete.  You life is your song. Write it.  Remember it and live it.

 

Filed Under: Featured Tagged With: art, music

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