Advent Calendar

I have been trying to come up with an advent calendar and this is what I ended up with! I am pretty excited about it! First I measured the back of the picture frame and cut a background fabric the same size. Next I cut images from my nativity fabric to create my own "story of Christmas" picture. I appliqued them onto the background and zig-zag stitched them into place. I then glued that to some cardboard to make is secure. Next I used a staple gun to staple it to the back of the frame.

I glued some Christmas paper to some cardboard, measured it to fit the front of the frame and cut it into 25 puzzle pieces. I then used sticky stuff to attach the puzzle to the Christmas story.

Each day we take off one piece of the puzzle. Each puzzle piece has the name of a Christmas song on it and we sing that song as well.

So far it is super fun and Skeeter gets really excited to take a piece of the puzzle off each day!

Tomato Cage Christmas Card Display

Super EASY holiday craft. I saw this idea in a magazine and stored it away in my brain until I had time to do it. I don't remember exactly how it looked in the mag. but I added some of my own personal touch and wa-lah! Very fun.

Materials needed:
Tomato cage
green fabric
yellow felt
rubber band
Christmas lights (optional)


Steps:
1. clean tomato cage and turn it upside down
2. Use rubber band to pull 3 prongs together
3. string tomato cage with lights (this was not in the original that I saw, but I thought it was a really fun addition!)
4. Measure distance from top of prong to first circular rung. (Mine was 13")
5. Cut a half circle out of green fabric. Use a focal point and draw the circle at 14" (I wish I could show you this but oh well...)
6. Pull material together in order to form a cone and pin at appropriate point
7. Sew together and now you should have a cone. Place on top of tomato cage
8. Cut a star out of felt and stick onto cone
9. Use paper clips, office clips, or clothes pins to attach Christmas cards that you receive.

I am SO excited about this craft. I can't wait to start getting some Christmas cards to fill it up!

Halloween

Skyler was a (super cute) little Cougar football player for Halloween. The helmet is a fun story but to keep it short I'll just say that it was free from a garage sale from a man who felt bad for me that my 2 year old was crying and throwing a fit that we had to leave the fun toys at the garage sale... check out this transformation. (This is actually Scotts craft-I can't take credit for it)


From gray Raiders....

Plus a little spray paint...

To awesome blue and white BYU Cougar:

Skyler was such a cute football player. However, when we went to boo at the zoo I thought something was missing-a football! He just didn't look quite right wiht a pumpkin.



So I decided to whip him up a football bag (made of felt) to catch his treats in:



Then once Hallween was over I decidd to trun that bag into a pillow to throw around:

Turkey

This was SO easy! It is just one of those wall hangings you buy at a fabric store. Put in some batting and a backing and wah-lah. Done. Totally cute though!

Carson's Baby Quilt

This is my first tie-quilt. I didn't do any hand stitching BUT I did a ton of cross stitch on the one side, so I still put a lot of time into his quilt. I love the cute little monkey print! And I love how the pillow at the end turned out. Thanks to Mandi for the idea for the pillow!

(Alphabet cross stitch)


(A close up of some of the cross-stitch)

(the back of the pillow)

(the front of the pillow-it has little ribs which give it a really fun texture!)

Decorative Cookie Sheet

This was one of our Super Saturday crafts and I think they turned out super cute! It is just a cookie sheet with 2 holes drilled through at top for the ribbon. EVERYTHING else is mod podged on. Pick some paper and make it your own. The magnets are mod podged as well-paper is mog podged onto the back of the clear stones and then we used E-6000 glue to attach the magnets. The ribbon across the middle is attached using double sided tape.

Window Valences

I made these a while ago. They are in Skylers room-they match his quilt that I made for him when he was born. Adds a nice touch to the room, but I think I might add curtains to. (Right now there are blinds)

Diaper Cake

I recently saw a diaper cake on a friends blog. With a baby shower coming up I decided that I wanted to try my hand at making a diaper cake. And so I did! A few friends went in on it with me and we had fun putting it together. It was definitely helpful to have some extra hands while trying to arrange everything. Here is the result!

My latest...

These are my latest projects. The first is an apron, with a double pocket in front, I made as part of my sisters bridal shower gift. It turned out really cute and I already had all of the material so it literally cost nothing!!

The next project was a dvd player case. We wanted this so we could make it easier to take on road trips with us! It turned out good and was nice to have on our road trip to Utah. Used same material as apron (above) and I made up my own pattern.

Ribbon Picture Squares

Since my brother has been living with us I noticed that in his room he had a bunch of pictures just scattered on the top of his dresser. I thought it would be fun to make something to hang his pictures up-that is what inspired this project. I am really excited about how they turned out!

Materials needed:

-some kind of base (I used a piece of 12x12 wood, a friend of mine used a cork board)

-quilt batting

-fabric of choice

-staple gun

-ribbon to match fabric

Instructions:
1. Cut batting and fabric to be 2 inches bigger than your base on all sides.
2. Place base on top of batting. Pull batting tight to the back of base and staple in place. Make sure to pull tight. Trim batting.
3. Place fabric on table, right side down. Next, place base w/batting on top of fabric. the back (side with staples) should be facing up. Pull fabric tightly and staple to back of base on all 4 sides. Trim fabric. NOTE: when doing the corners, tuck the fabric as though you were wrapping a present-tucking the corners inside.

4. String ribbon diagnolly across front of project. Hold tightly in place and flip over. Staple ribbons in place (it helps if you have one person to hold the ribbon tight and another to staple)
5. Continue stringing and stapling ribbon in both directions until there is enough ribbon to hold pictures in place.
6. To hang project do one of the following:

-staple 2 pieces of ribbon to hte back of project about 2 inches from the top and 2 inches from eachother. Tie the two ribbons together and hang on nail in desire location.

-or, get a bracket (the kind you see on the back of picture frames) and attach with small nails.

These are the 4 that we made (2 for my brother and 2 for Skeeters room):

Skeeters-done and in his room:

Ethans-done and in his room:

Name Plaque

At Super Saturday (big craft day) I learned a new technique involving Mod Podge. I made a wooden plaque with the first letter of my last name on it. I took that idea and made this name plaque for my new niece, Kylie Rose. It turned out really well!

Materials Needed:
Wooden plaque (any shape)
Wooden letters
scrapbook paper (background)
Mod Podge
Decals (optional)
Foam brush(es)

Directions:
1) Paint trim of wooden plaque (anything that will show once paper is on) and letters desired colors
2) Mod Podge the surface of the wood
3) Place paper onto wet M.P., smooth out and cover with THIN layer of M.P.
4) LET DRY COMPLETELY!
5) M.P. the back of the letters and stick in place on top of paper. M.P. around and over letters to secure in place. Smooth out any lumps/spots of M.P. otherwise they will dry as is.
6) Allow to dry

*the plaque can be hung however you want. i like to insert 2 nails into the back of the plaque and use a ribbon.

Notes: I used a 3-D sticker of a rose for Kylie's middle name: Rose. Stickers can be used or little wooden decals, which would have to be M.P. on.

The key to making this look good is making sure everything is DRY. Don't get impatient-just give it time. To speed up the drying you can use a hair dryer on LOW.