Wishing all our readers a wonderful 2010! Keep track of the days with our free calendar download.
This small (about post-it sized) calendar is great for your desk or to hang on your fridge. After cutting out the months use rubber cement glue to bind the tops together to create a tear-off calendar. Punch a hole at the top to hang.
When I was young, my sister and I would leave out cookies and milk for Santa. We would also write him a little thank you note or some years leave a “Don’t eat these Dad, they’re for Santa!” sign. Making these reminded me of those younger years and of the older ones where we would remind each other to eat the cookies before our younger brother woke up!
Download embes Santa note template.
A few weeks ago I posted about some party theme ideas I found. In the end I decided to go with a color theme of pink and green and to save the more specific themes until our little one was older.
The color theme came about when I was making the invitations. I turned to scrapblog.com to create it because I knew it would give me the stickers I needed and the freedom to create the invitation I envisioned. Scrapblog offers printing but I had some cardstock already and decided to print the invitations at home.
After that it all came together….
From top to bottom:
The “happy 1st birthday” banner was home-made using scrapbook paper, cardstock, and paper string. Look for a tutorial in our craft tip of the week soon!
The scrapbook pages were displayed on a wall and featured a lot of our baby’s firsts and milestones.
I wanted to share with our guests the monthly photos I took so that they could see how much she had changed. Each month had two photos tied together with ribbon and pinned up with a clothespin decorated with flower punch-outs.
No party is complete without a birthday hat! There will also be a tutorial for this in the craft tip of the week soon as well.
We started the party in the birthday shirt and tutu, which were a huge hit. The front is our little one’s first initial with a little crown – for being the little princess! The back of the shirt says, “I’m one!” with a large one underneath. The onesie was made using photoshop and iron-on sheets. The tutu was bought from Trinity’s Tutus on Etsy.
It was a lot of fun making many of the decorations and celebrating our little one’s first birthday with family and friends. I think she really enjoyed it too!
When you’re in need of an activity for the little ones (or big ones) pull out those twist ties and exercise your imagination by making people, animals, buildings – anything! Not to sound cliche, but the possibilities are endless and you’re only limited by your imagination.
I discovered this art when I was setting up a computer at my old job. While waiting for software to install I started twisting them around my finger and thought, “Hmm, this looks a little like a person” and the man twist tie was born (on the right).
Always looking for a challenge, after making people I thought why not try an animal. Silhouettes were a little challenging for me so I ventured into 3-d and ta-da – little puppies!
This one is my favorite though. I like the simplicity of the curves and how they form a flower. This was formed purely by accident. I just started twirling the twist tie around my finger and then pulled the long end out. Instantly I thought it looked like a flower and did the same to the other end.
And just in time for the holidays I found this Twistie-tie Pompom Gift Toppers tutorial (from Nice Package blog) for those of you who need a job for the little helpers in your house. It’s a great way for them to feel involved with the gift wrapping while staying (a little bit) out of your hair!
As a knitter I have tons of patterns that hope to make someday printed and organized into 3-ring binders (this was the days before Ravelry!) They were looking a bit uninspired and plain on my bookshelf.
To give them a new look I cut scrapbook paper to size and tucked it in the bind. Rather then trying to remember which color binder was which I stamped the words “PATTERNS – ADULT” and “PATTERNS – BABY” on white paper and glued it on.
Now they’re also a decorative piece on our bookshelf!
A hint for sliding in the bind- open the folder flat to give yourself more room. You can’t see it from the pic but one of them got a little bit bent while I was putting it in!
Tissue boxes have become more decorative over the years. Gone are the days of the marbled blues, greens, and browns – thank goodness!
For a long time I always thought it was a shame to toss them out (in the recycling bin of course!) but never knew what to do with them if I kept them. Then one day it hit me, I could use them to make a mobile for over my daughters changing table!
All you need is an animal shape, an empty tissue box, chopsticks, string and some glue and voila! A mobile.
Here are the basic steps:
1. Cut out the animal shape from the tissue box (use two boxes for varied colors and designs). Make half of the shapes reversed so that you can glue them together and have the pretty side out.
2. Glue the pieces together with the string in between. I doubled the string and put the loop at the top to attach it to the chopsticks.
3. Use string to tie the chopsticks into an X shape. (Leave a tail for attaching it to the ceiling.)
4. Wrap the string from the shapes around the chopstick ends a few times to secure. This is where making the loop in step 2 comes in handy.
5. Hang and enjoy!
I’m a sucker for making the small things look pretty. At my old job I even decorated my pen/pencil holder (ie. a paper cup!) by drawing on it with a sharpie. Print-it-yourself calendars are often plain to look at. Why not dress them up by printing it on decorative paper?
These are the basic steps if you already have decorative paper:
Step 1: Select your paper.
Step 2: Open the calendar file.
Step 3: Load the paper into your printer. Make sure the pretty side is what will be printed on.
Step 4: Print!
If you don’t have any decorative paper- no worries! You can do what I did for the calendar in the image. I went to Canon’s Creative Park. They have free download-able scrap booking backgrounds, borders, stickers, and letters.
For October I wanted something halloween-ish and found this one with spiderwebs. I printed the paper first and then followed steps 2-4. I used Microsoft Word to print the calendar and moved it to the bottom right for aesthetics (I like white space! Plus it gives me room to add notes.)
My daughter loves toys that make the crinkly noise. She also loves to wake up before us in the mornings but we’re lucky that she will play in her crib for awhile before calling out for “ma ma ma ma.” We usually know she’s up though by the “crinkle crinkle” noises coming from the crib because I always put the soft one in before I go to bed.
She only has one soft crinkly toy and not wanting her to get bored of it I decided I’d make her one. The idea struck when I was refilling the diaper basket and was getting ready to throw away the plastic bag they come in. As I was crumpling it up it made a “crinkle” and a picture flashed in my head of a plush toy. After digging through my fabric and craft boxes I sat down at the sewing machine and made Ella the elephant!
She’s stuffed with two of the diaper bags which makes it soft as well as crinkly and perfect for an in the crib toy. I added some texture using a reverse applique for the ear, button for the eye, a knitted i-cord for the tail and stripes of ribbon on the back.
I went a little overboard on the details, but it doesn’t have to be. Sewing a silhouette of an animal and embroidered facial features would be just as fun for any baby – the important part is that it crinkles!
My daughter recently discovered my stash of beauty products under the bathroom sink. Don’t worry, I’ve moved it now that she’s found it! I keep them in a small basket and it houses things such as lotion, hair products, nail polish remover, hair clips, brush etc. I would have thought with so many things available for her to get into she would go from one thing to another, but nope, she went straight for the blue nail polish remover.
I watched as she shook it and passed it from hand to hand mesmerized by the blue water moving back and forth. Until now we’ve only given her water bottles to play with (which she loves!) Watching her stare at the colored water inspired me to add a little color to one of her favorite toys.
I filled the bottles to varying degrees and added two to three drops of food coloring in each. Instant new toy! Giving her a new color each day makes the novelty last a little longer.
Tried & true recipes!
Before Cathy and I had kids, we had dinner and movie nights pretty frequently. The husbands really enjoyed it too because it was our opportunity to try something new and be creative with our dishes, whether the recipe came from one of our trusted cookbooks or from an episode of “Everyday Italian” or “Barefoot Contessa” that we watched earlier in the week.
Of course, Cathy and I did all the planning, first figuring out who would host that week. The host would prepare the meal and the other couple would bring wine or dessert which usually fit the theme for the night (i.e. Asian, American, Italian, Mexican, etc.). We even had movie themes…comedy, Johnny Depp, horror, action, and so on. We had our share of bad movie picks, but the evening was fun, nonetheless, sharing a good meal with good company.
Our dinner get-togethers (pre-baby!)
We haven’t had a dinner/movie night in a while, but with the kids being a little older and sleeping better at night, I think it would be fun to start them up again…my cookbooks will be happy to see me, and it has been a while since I’ve had a date with Johnny Depp!
