Easter garland

Last night I was feeling a little crafty, but I knew I wanted to do something that my kids could also help with. The other day, I saw this really cool idea on another blog:

(photo from Modern Parents Messy Kids)

Unfortunately, I don't have piles of paint chips lying around, but I do have tons of scrapbook paper scraps that I've been saving for just this sort of activity. I pulled out a bunch of "Eastery" colored papers, and traced egg shapes on the back. (I used the template available from the above link). Then we got to work. My almost-8-year-old, and my newly-4-year-old both had a fabulous time cutting them out. I thought about "fixing" the ones that my younger daughter cut, but then decided against it. I love that she was able to help!

(Sorry for not "staging" my photo better, lol. I was in a hurry!)



Can you guess which ones my 4-year-old cut?




It was a great activity for the 3 of us to do together, and I'm thinking about making a few more garlands to put up elsewhere in our home, too.

Advent Calendar

Last week during one of my daily craft blog surf's, I saw this post from Homemade By Jill about a darling felt advent calendar. I went to the blog she had referenced, and instantly fell in love with THIS idea. I put it in my Tutorials to Try link list, hoping that I'd have time to do it before December.

Well, seems like this week I've had nothing BUT time! So I got busy on it. I'm not done yet, but here is a little sneak peak on what I've accomplished so far.




I am too impatient to do all of the intricate hand stitching that was done in the original, so I have just been using regular old craft glue to keep it together. It's not nearly as cute as hers, but it gets the job done. I may have to stitch the pockets on, though, because for some reason the glue is not doing it's job there.

Well, I'm still plugging away at it, so stay tuned for the big reveal!

Butterfly Hair Clips tutorial

Well, this is my first tutorial, and I'm going to be upfront here... I did it in a hurry and the photos are not great, but hopefully you'll get the general idea!! :) You can see my original butterfly hair clip post HERE. Feel free to let me know if any parts of this are not clear.

First, preheat your oven to 250 degrees F (125 degrees C).

Gather your supplies:

Grosgrain ribbon in coordinating colors

hot glue gun/glue

alligator hair clip

thin wooden dowel

lighter

pencil

Step 1: Wrap the ribbon that you intend to use for the butterfly's body around the wooden dowel, secure the ends with either wooden clothes pins, or your metal hair clips. (This dowel was too big, but it was the only one I had.)

Step 2: Put your ribboned dowel on a cookie sheet and place in the oven for 25 minutes.

Step 3: Choose your ribbon for the butterfly wings. You need two coordinating colors. The outer color needs to be 2 inches longer than the inside. For this butterfly, I did 8 inches in the dark pink, and 6 inches in the white. (It also works well in a 10/8 measurements, but if you go bigger than that, you might need to play around with thicker ribbon to see how it looks.

Step 4: Fold your ribbon in half, and mark the center with a pencil.



Step 5: Fold the end of your ribbon to meet the center, and crease it, then mark the crease with a pencil.

You should now have marks on the 1/4 and 1/2 points of your ribbon.

Step 6: Using a lighter, (I used a candle since I needed to take a pic at the same time... and please excuse my messy desk, haha), lightly singe the ends of your ribbon so that they won't come unraveled.



Step 7: Put a dot of hot glue just to the right side of your 1/2 mark, then fold your ribbon over this way and secure it down. The 1/4 mark should be on the bottom edge of the horizontal piece of ribbon.

Step 8: Do the same with the other side of ribbon.


Step 9: Fold over the bottom parts of ribbon like this, making sure not to twist the ribbon backwards. The loop should be on the front, with the end gluing to the back.

Step 10: Do the same with your other ribbon.

Step 11: Put a dab of hot glue in the center of your bigger ribbon, and stick the smaller ribbon inside.

Step 12: Your dowel ribbon should be done in the oven by now and cooled down a bit. Remove the ribbon from the dowel, and it should be curled like this. Snip off an inch or so, (whatever is suitable for the size of your butterfly), and hot glue it to the middle of your butterfly.

Step 13: Cut two 1/2 inch pieces of really thin ribbon for the antennae. Put a dab of glue on the back of your butterfly and put the two antennae in place.

It should look something similar to this now:

Step 14: Next, take your alligator clip, and cut 4.5 inches of coordinating ribbon, and melt the edges. Starting underneath the top part of the clip, hot glue the ribbon on. Wrap around the top and into the hinge area, and halfway across the bottom.



Step 15: Put a dab of hot glue on the top of the clip, and attach your butterfly.

Enjoy!


Thanks for reading!

Glitterati

It's taken me a few days to be able to post this because my hubby had the camera at work with him.

I've never been huge on decorating for "minor" holidays, (ok, let's be honest, I only ever decorate for Christmas), but this year I wanted to dive in and start decorating other times of the year, too. First up, Valentine's Day.

You all saw this easy-peasy heart garland we made a few weeks ago, but it just wasn't doing it for me. (Whatever "it" is...). It's cute, but it just wasn't enough. So, a couple weeks ago while I was out and about, I stumbled across a styrofoam heart wreath, and some glitter. Had to get it because who knew when I would be out that way again.

I couldn't take any "during" pictures because, like I said, Sam had the camera at work with him. But here's a little sneak peak before the projects were completely finished:





Finished projects:

Hanging hearts inspired by THIS POST.



Hearts cut out of cereal boxes, used a paint brush to spread white school glue around in a thin layer, sprinkled glitter, (or rather, poured glitter) all over the heart (and all around the table and floor... eek!). Let dry, flipped over and did the same to the back side. We used different colors on both sides for a fun effect. Hung up on our light w/ white ribbon. Easy peasy and so fun for the kids. (I'm going to be cleaning up glitter for months!)

THIS blog post inspired the next craft:



I had some twine that I started wrapping around the heart, but it was too thin and wasn't giving me the look I was hoping for, so I scrapped that and went with red ribbon instead. Then using the same technique as the glitter hearts above, (i.e. using a paintbrush to lightly spread white craft glue all along the surface), I glitterized (haha) an old frame I had in my closet. I wish I had spray paint, but alas. I kind of like it. It's funky. And it could probably be used with several different holidays, I just have to change what's hanging inside. :)

(Funny story... when my hubby came home from work and saw the frame while it was drying, his eyes widened in horror and said, "You're not putting our family picture in that, are you?" Haha, I still laugh about it.)

I can't decide if I like the black in the background or not. If I was hanging the frame, I would not have the black there, but since I needed to use the frame stand, the black is there.

**Note** You can head over to my family blog to hear a special love song every day leading up to Valentine's Day. :)

Baby Shower!

This past Saturday, I hosted a baby shower for my good friend Audrey, who, sadly, is moving away in a couple days. :( One of our other friends brought pasta salad and prepared the games, (thanks, April!), and two other friends, (Thanks Danly and Vivien!), brought the beautiful roses and bowls of fruit. I prepared the other food, but everyone helped with setting up and cleaning up afterward. Usually in our social circle, these things become potlucks, but I didn't want to do that this time.

First of all, the spread...

Cake/mini cupcakes, heart-shaped brownies, veggies crudites with hummous dip, olives, tortilla roll-ups, pasta salad, Asian Wonton Salad, strawberries, grapes, and 7-layer Mexican bean dip w/ tortilla chips.

A close up... I made the Asian Wonton Salad for our book group meeting earlier in the week, and everyone loved it. So I decided to go ahead and make it for the baby shower, too. Again, everyone loved it. You should try it. So easy, and so yummy! Find the recipe HERE.

With the 7-layer dip, I didn't follow an exact recipe. I intended to use Pioneer Woman's recipe, and her recipe for guacamole and pico de gallo, but I ran out of time. So it ended up being a basic compliation of several recipes.

I started with a layer of refried beans (with a bit of taco seasoning mixed in), then a layer of sour cream, then a layer of guacamole (3 ripe, mashed avocados + finely chopped tomatoes w/ the seeds and "wet" part removed + finely chopped red onion + a little salt + juice of half a lime), then a layer of salsa, then a layer of sharp cheddar cheese, a layer of shredded lettuce, layer of chopped olives, tomatoes and topped with chopped green onions. It took me longer to put it all together than I had planned, but it turned out good and everyone seemed to like it.

I couldn't believe how easy the tortilla roll-ups were to make. I didn't follow one exact recipe, but looked at several and then came up with these on my own. I used "cilantro and garlic" flavored tortillas. The inside mixture is a combination of 1 pkg (8 oz.) cream cheese, about 1/3 cup sour cream, finely chopped red bell pepper, finely chopped red onion, finely chopped black olives. You spread a thin layer of the mixture on each tortilla, add a slice of ham or turkey (if you want), and roll it up. Tightly wrap with saran wrap, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours. I made these the day before, so they refrigerated about 24 hours. When you're ready to serve them, you just cut off the "wonky" ends, and then slice them in 1/2 inch pieces. Yummy! I got a lot of good comments on these.

It took me a long time to decide what cake I wanted to make. I finely decided on this cake. I'm sorry, I can't remember where I got the idea from, but I probably googled "baby shower cakes" and a photo came up somewhere. So anyway, this is basically just a yellow cake mix with cream cheese frosting. I LOVE this recipe for cream cheese frosting, though because of the butter it turns the frosting a light yellow. I need to find one that will let the frosting be white so that it can be tinted a different color w/out looking funny. The flowers are just plain m&m's, but it tasted so yummy all together! :)

Cream cheese frosting:

1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened

2 tsp. vanilla

5 3/4 - 6 1/4 cups sifted powdered sugar

Beat cream cheese, butter, and vanilla with mixer until light and fluffy. Gradually add 2 cups powdered sugar, beating well. Gradually beat in additional powdered sugar to reach spreading consistency. (This frosts tops & sides of two 8" or 9" layers. Half the recipe for a 9x13 cake.)

CAKE DECORATING TIP #1!

When trying to decide what cake to make, I looked up some websites about tips for frosting a layered cake. I learned a very good tip! When you frost the sides and top, do what is called a "crumb layer" of frosting. That is, just put on a very thin layer of frosting first, and yes it will pick up some of the crumbs. Then, put the cake in the freezer for about 15-20 minutes until the frosting hardens. Then do another, thicker layer of frosting on top. It's much easier to spread this way, and none of the crumbs get pulled to the top layer of frosting. It looks much nicer.

I brought a bunch of little silk flowers to scatter around the table for some extra color. I also made 2 candle holders (hard to see in the pic above), by using pretty-shaped jam jars, tying pretty ribbon around the mouth of them, and putting pink tea-candles inside. It was a nice added touch, I thought.

Lastly, I made this little "advice" book for Audrey, since it's her first baby. I bought a small hard backed notebook and covered it with fabric, and hot-glued on the embellishments. On the inside front/back flaps, I taped in coordinating paper, and throughout the book I taped in cute parenting quotes.

Audrey, you will be missed. Thanks for being such a great friend!

Simple Felt Heart Garland

I am repenting! I have been daydreaming too much and getting so sucked into reading other people's craft blogs, that I haven't done any crafting myself! Well, last night, that all changed. My hubby was on-call at work again, which meant I could get out my sewing machine and all my stuff and having it laying around guilt-free! :)

I've been seeing a lot of Valentine's decor lately on the blogs, and I was wishing I could make something. But since our flat is so small, and HK isn't exactly the craft capitol of the world, it's hard to do much decorating. But when I saw THIS simple felt heart valentine garland, I knew it would be perfect.

First I cut out about a million little felt hearts, (thankfully I had felt left over from my Mr. Potato Head project), and then Maya and Zoe helped me arrange them into order. And we decided to jazz some of them up by adding stripes. Fun, right? (Please excuse the unmade bed and surrounding mess. It was a really laid back day, lol)



I first took the ones that were going to have stripes and just sewed all the stripes on, and then trimmed around the edges. When I finished that, I just sewed them all together through the middles. (The ones that have contrasting hearts layered on them don't have any additional stitching holding them on besides the stitches through the middle.)





Cute, right?

My very first Valentine's Day decoration!

(And how cute is this? Maya went to a birthday party on Saturday, and she got a little felt sewing kit project. Here she is trying to sew. I helped her a bit, but I think this project might be a little advanced for her. Any ideas for a simple sewing craft for kids?)