Quiet Book

So my little baby turns one in two weeks. It is crazy how time flies. One comes with a whole new age of walking, fidgeting, and general ransacking of the house. This has also become a difficulty at church lately so I have been working on a project, a quiet book! While it won't entertain my little baby, it will entertain my older girls and give me a chance to keep all the kids at a manageable noise level. :)

This is the folder I plan to keep it all in. It is a regular folder that I modge podged with a pink fabric.
The first page is a red barn. It has two folding doors. I sewed the doors first and then the top of the barn. I outlined the top of the barn with white. All the pages and contents are made from felt. The doors of the barn are double layered and contain paper to make them stiffer.
Under the doors I have a white pocket. I sewed the white pocket first. It now contains 4 finger pockets. A pig, a cat, a cow, and a chicken.
The second page is a Mr. Potato head. I have since added more accessories...I have to admit, I got a little carried away with all the fun faces I could put on the Mr. Potato! (I'll update more pictures next week)

I have three more pages that currently working on but I will update those next week!

Organizing Our Home: Mini Fabric Bolts & Mini-Mini Bolts

I have to confess. I have A LOT of fabric. My husband might say that I have TOO MUCH fabric, but we can discuss that another day. The biggest problem with my fabric is that all the pieces are different. Some are just left overs from another project, some are fat quarters, and some are a few yards, just waiting to be cut and sewn. It seemed that no matter how I folded and piled, it never looked or was organized. I often knew (or thought I knew) that I had a certain piece of fabric, but then I couldn't find it. Or I would tear everything apart looking for it and end up frustrated and with a bigger mess.

I have seen a number of different ideas for making mini bolts, but I had a hard time finding the materials recommended or didn't want to spend that much money.

What you need:

20 x 30 Foam Core Board (I found mine at Walmart for under $2 a board)

Jumbo Paper Clips (found at Walmart in the Office Supply section)

Ruler/Yard Stick & Pencil

Sharp Knife

I first measured and drew out the cutting lines. The Mini Bolts measured 10 inches x 5 inches. I drew out all the lines I needed to cut on and then cut along the lines with sharp knife. Then I took a piece of fine sandpaper and gentle smoothed out the rough spots and edges.

Then I took my fabric, layed it out flat, folded the raw edges to the center, and began wrapping it around one board. When I got the end of the fabric I folded the edges under and secured them to the other layers of fabric using the jumbo paper clips.

For the Mini-Mini Bolts: Draw lines that are 6 inches x 4 inches. And follow that same instructions for cutting and folding.

I found that I could fit up to about 2 yards of neatly folded cotton on a Mini Bolt and the Mini-Mini Bolts were perfect for fat quarters, 1/4-1/2 yard cuts, and smaller left over pieces.

I love how I can easily see and grab what pieces I need and how neat and tidy it makes my shelves look. And how inexpensive it turned out to be. Hope this gives you an idea of organizing your creative space, have a great weekend!

Valentine Wreath....

I wanted to make a wreath for our mantel for Valentine's Day, but I didn't want to spend a lot of money or time or brain power working on something. I am really happy with how this wreath turned out and it didn't have to be 'perfect'.

Here's what you need:

Coffee Filters (They come in a huge package, this was actually left over from another project I did)

Fabric Dye (I used Tuplip Red and found it at Walmart)

Hot Glue Gun and Glue Sticks

Scissors

Wreath form, whatever size and shape you would like

FIRST: you need to dye your coffee filters. This isn't hard and it doesn't have to be perfect. I used a large plastic tub in my sink. I DID NOT use all the dye. Just a bit, until it was the color I was looking for. I put about a tablespoon of salt in the tub, then the powdered dye, and added about 2 cups of boiling water. I stirred until it was all dissolved.

You MUST WEAR GLOVES! I wore throw-away medical gloves, but it doesn't really matter what you wear, just wear gloves. I dripped some on the back of my hand and could not get it off, it is slowly fading, but still there.

Add the coffee filters to the tub of dye. Make sure that they are fully covered, move them around and let them sit for as long as you like. The longer they sit in the dye the darker they will be. I did 3 batches of coffee filters, the first I let sit the longest time, and then less time and less to get a multi-shade look. 

(Sorry there are no pictures of this, but I was home alone and I didn't want to dye my hands or my camera)

Over the tub ring out the coffee filters, they are amazingly strong and I just rung out all the excess moisture. And then place them in another dry tub or bucket (remember nothing that you love it might be dyed for a while).

Once I had all the coffee filters rung out, I threw them in the dryer. Yes, my clothes dryer. I adjusted the temp to be low-medium and then let them tumble around. But watch them, this is probably a no-no and a fire hazard, so don't leave your dryer unattended. But it only took a few minutes for the coffee filters to be fluffed and dry.

Now it is time to make the ruffley-flower things for the wreath. First, fold a coffee filter in half.

 Then cut it along the fold. Now you have 2 halves.

 Fold one half in half like this.

 Then in half again.

 Then twist the pointed end. If you don't want your wreath to be real fluffy, twist it more. If you want fluff, twist less.

 Snip off the pointy part with scissors.

 Then hold the twisted part and pull apart all the the different folded layers to look like this. Then glue it to the wreath form with hot glue. And repeat until your wreath is full. 

I added a small piece of ribbon to the back for hanging and you are done! Enjoy!

Rice Crispy Valentines

 I saw this yummy and easy treat idea at Mel's Kitchen Cafe the other day (see post HERE) and decided to try it out and add my own spin to it. Can I just say that chocolate dipped rice crispy treats are heaven sent! Who knew something so simple could make such a difference? We ate about half of the treats I made, but the other half went to my kid's friends for Valentine's day. I put two hearts in each goodie bag (found at Wal-mart) and added the saying, "You make my heart go SNAP, CRACKLE, POP!" I came up with that saying right out of my own little head... :) Happy Valentine's everyone!

Butterfly wall decor

Oh Pinterest. Who really can be bored today now that we have Pinterest? You don't even have to do any of the crafts. You could just oogle all day long at things that you could, would, want, hope, to do. I do this thing where I try to hold out as long as I can when I really want chocolate (I always hope to make it after the kids are in bed....) and I find myself doing the same thing with Pinterest. How long can I resist before I go back and spend the rest of the afternoon sifting through the goodness?!

And on that note here is a craft for my wall that I found on Pinterest. When you're renting you're so limited and have to be clever in how to make your home more livable!

I saw this idea and thought I'd give it a try. In the picture I found they made their butterflies out of soda cans. I don't drink nearly enough soda to attempt this any time soon so I made my butterflies out of card stock. I chose white although I preferred black. I would suggest picking a color and sticking with it because I cut out about 50 butterflies and that took several days. I painted about half of my butterflies black when I had this idea to paint half of them black and look like the white ones escaped out of the paint. I kind of like how it turned out. I may make some of the escaped white ones colored as well and make them a bit wild. If I do I will post the updated version. But anyway, this is pretty straight forward. I printed off some butterfly shapes I liked and had about 8 different shapes. Then I traced 50 butterflies, cut them out and pinned them on the wall with sewing pins. (Poke right through the paper and into the wall) I let them stick out a little to give them a little dimension. In the future I would have glued them to the push pins first because they had a tendency to tilt downwards when I didn't want them to. To get the design I wanted I used a pencil on the wall to draw it out and then pushed the pins along the design. Overall I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

Tissue Paper Pom Poms

I'm back everyone! I took a little break from blogging to deal with all the Christmas chaos but I made a resolution to keep up with this blog so here goes. My baby turned one this month and we had a little party at an ice cream shop to celebrate. I made these pom poms for decorations and they were super easy. This would be a great way to use up recycled tissue paper... or am I the only one that keeps tissue paper?? Anyway- The original instructions are from Martha Stewart, go HERE for those.

All you need:
1 package of tissue paper
Floral wire (I used twist ties)
Scissors

 Pull the tissue paper right out of the package and straighten it out, all 8 layers stacked on top of each other. Begin folding it like an accordion, each fold being about an inch and a half.

 It should look like this when finished. Pinch it in the middle and either tie your wire or cut the edges to be rounded or pointy. I rounded my edges with the scissors and then tied my twist ties in the middle.

 After that, begin gently pulling out each layer of the tissue paper one at a time forming a ball.

 That's it! Super easy. They are pretty big too, at least a foot and a half across.

We tied ours to the ceiling with fishing line. In retrospect I would have made more, but they added a little extra fun to the party anyway. Afterward, I hung them above my daughters crib and they look so cute!

Save those Christmas Cards

And recycle them into a Christmas ABC book!

When we were expecting our first daughter, my husband's mom gave us an ABC book that she made out of Christmas cards. She had made one for each of her children when they were young and was passing down my husband's to us. I decided then I wanted to make one for my nephew. I started collecting our Christmas cards. And my parents'. And my husband's parents'.

Five years later, I had enough cards.  I'm telling you...it took forever because so many people send out family picture cards or Christmas emails.  So now it is no longer just my nephew in that family, but 2 nephews and a brand new niece.  I do have some left over cards, but you need a ton to be able to choose for each letter and then the number.

My husband's mom made hers in 1" binders with page protectors and red and green paper.  I made mine in an 8x8 scrapbook with page protectors (had to buy 2 refill packs to add to it) and Christmas scrapbook paper.  Both are super easy.  Hers has more room on a page and is cheaper by far.

The one I made for my nephews and niece

The one made for my husband

Here are some hints I used/realized:

• Group similar cards (i.e. angels, snowmen, etc.)
• Leave letters that have multiple words (S is for Shepards, Star, Snowman, Snow, Snowflake, etc) for last
• Use a business card template for the wording, I only had to cut a few smaller
• Wish I would have used less patterned paper for the backgrounds, some are too busy to read
• Let glue dry for a at least 45 minutes to ensure it doesn't make the page protectors go wavy.  (You can see it in mine on pages "X" & "Y")
• I had to go to the dollar store and pick up a few cards for letters I didn't have, like "Y" (yule log).

The kids loved these books and gazing at each picture.  It does take some effort in collecting and sorting out each letter, but it is pretty simple after that, just cutting and gluing.

Here is the Christmas ABC document I created to help me sort out cards.  It is just what I gathered from here and there so it is rough.  There are repeats, some very closely worded, and some without rhymes.  You can really do whatever you can come up with.  The ones in bold are the ones I ended up using with the cards I had.

Start collecting those Christmas cards now (ask family and neighbors for the fronts of theirs too), or your kids might be graduating from high school by the time you get enough.

Heads up: Also you may be able to score cheap some cards the day after Christmas at the store.  And  I saw a Christmas card at Wal-mart that had children holding hands around a world - perfect for letter "U".  Don't know how much it was though.  Some cards are way too expensive.