Letters from Santa

I thought I would dust off this old blog and tell you about an easy gift idea. I sent some of O's friends letters from "Santa". So easy, I just got some Christmas themed stationary and composed the letter. I made sure to include specifics about each child (city, siblings...etc.), and of course a nice list of all the things they do to be good!

Personalized Note Cards

I discovered this website, and it really got me excited to experiment with stamping. Its http://www.holmesstamp.com/. From there you can design a rubber stamp with your name (or any word/phrase). I purchased one for me and both the girls, and I was so happy with them I decided to craft them into gifts for O's preschool teachers. She has really amazing teachers, so I wanted to do a bit more than the group gift we contributed to. I thought this gift was especially special because O could actually be the one to make it for them (with a little help from Mommy of course). The stamp works double duty-after we used it to make the card it makes a nice addition to the gift.

Curly Hair Bows

My crafty friend Kelly turned me on to making these type of hair bows for the girls. Once I got the hang of it I found that they are really easy to make; you just need the right supplies. Through this project I discovered a nifty product called Fray Check. You put it on fabric (in this case the ribbon) after you cut it and it won't fray. WOW!

Circus Party Time!

The Circus Party has come and gone, and I think it was a big hit. O had two volumes on party day--loud and PARTY LOUD! She was pretty excited. The house was decorated with the usual circus type things-balloons, clown clothes and wigs, and a great circus tent (courtesy of Grandma and Papa). The food was cotton candy, popcorn, a cracker jack snack, chocolate covered pretzels, and some grapes (not so circusy, but I had to offer at least something a little healthy). My favorite part was the clown cupcakes as seen in the picture. That's a marshmallow head, with chocolate sprinkles for eyes, a cut gumdrop for a nose, gumdrop hat, and icing decorations. I used buttercream because it keeps its shape a bit better than the icing I usually make. The favors were popcorn bags with cotton candy and clown noses inside. I have to learn to take better pictures, I think this stuff was a lot cuter in person.

Blog fans (i.e. my parents, J and A) get excited for this weekend. Husband is finally home and I am going to spend some time downstairs in my craft area! Many projects in the hopper.

Ducky Cupcakes

I can hardly believe it, but my baby is turning 3! I am sending these cupcakes to class with her tomorrow to celebrate. She is in the ducky class, so O wanted her cupcakes to be decorated as such. The idea was cuter in my head than it came out; luckily my audience is two and three year olds. O had fun baking and decorating (and snacking on) them with me.

V's Baby Book

Here are some pages I made for V's baby book with the new paper I mentioned in the last post. It is by Basic Grey, the style is called LilyKate. I am really impressed with the quality of their products, especially the letter stickers. I am hoping to be more dilligent with this book, although I am not known among my friends as the fastest scrapbooker!

O's Baby Book

Since O is turning 3, its long overdue that I finish her baby book - added pressure is that V is now almost 4 months old and her book has not even been looked at yet! Here are some highlights from O's book. The paper is from Chatterbox. I just ordered the most beautiful paper for V's book-I will post some pictures when I get it.

Fairy Costume

Its almost Halloween, and I would have loved to sew O's costume, but as we just got back from Disney, she is going to wear her Cinderella costume, or "beeee-uuuu-tiful gown" as she likes to call it. Here is a picture of the homemade fairy costume from last year. It was my first real sewing project. It wasn't perfect, but I did learn a lot from doing it. I really liked how the headpiece and arm straps came out. The skirt had some room for improvement; using a squirmy two year old as a model was not the easiest way to learn! The wings were made of wire and panty hose, and then spray painted. Shoes were just ballet slippers with some flowers sewn onto them.

Circus Party Invitations

O's turning 3, and since our house feels like a circus most of the time, we thought we would theme the party as such. These are pictures of the invitation. Its the first time I've tried stamping, and I think they turned out pretty cute. Taking pictures of O with the clown nose was hilarious, she definitely fit the part as a clown!

Pumpkin Patch Hair Bow

As the mother of two girls, I am always on the hunt for hairbows. Unfortunately this year I waited too long to buy fall colored ones. Since the store was now fully stocked with Christmas bows, I thought I would try my hand at making the girls bows that matched their pumpkin shirts.

Glitter Pumpkins

I saw these in Martha Stewart's magazine. It was a fun project to do with O. I applied the glue and then she got to sprinkle (or pour) the glitter on them. Although there was more glitter on my floor than on the pumpkin, it was a great little project to do with a toddler.

My very first blog

So, I thought this would be a fun way to keep track of some of my crafts and projects, and maybe share with my friends. Enjoy!