Disney baby toys

Our family vacation is close! We leave sooner than I can believe...six months of waiting and it's finally here!!

I made these for my son for our trip. I have been collecting Disney treats and prizes for my daughter (details in a post after we return) but didn't have much for my son. I know that an 8 month old will never remember the trip or know that he didn't get any special treats during it but I wanted to include him anyway.

But, what could I give to him? I was having no luck finding inexpensive trinkets appropriate for his age so I made my own.

First I made him a crinkle toy. Made from simple black felt and some ribbon taggies. I put some plastic wrap inside of it for the noise. I like to use the bags that microwave popcorn comes wrapped in...perfect sound and level of crunch.

 The other toys I made are my favorites. I personally can't believe how good these turned out. For once the way they turned out looked as good as they had looked in my head! I used felt squares and made all my own 'patterns'. I cut it all out and glued it together with my glue gun...no sewing for these prizes!

Now, vacation just has to get here so he can have them!

Tangled Inspired dress

Our Disney World vacation is fast approaching. I have been trying to finish all of my projects and shopping for it...you would think that having planned this since March I would be a little more prepared. Not the case, my friends.

I was very proud of myself for finishing my daughter's 'princess' dress for our trip last week. I wanted her to have something special and princess themed for when we have breakfast with the princesses.  I didn't really want her to wear a dress up dress or anything that looked like one of the princess dresses. I figured there would be plenty of those there and I wanted her to stand out :)

I got the idea from etsy. I go there for inspiration and figure out how to make it myself for much cheapper. I found a sundress with appliques on it and made my own version. I found pictures on Google of the sun and Pascal and free handed the tower myself.
I made the dress in a pillowcase fashion for my own sanity. I am not crazy about them but I knew how easy they were. So I did it. Except I used a flat sheet. I found it for $2.99 at Salvation army and now I have plenty of fabric left for yet another Tangled idea I have for her. I used pieces of scrap out of my stash for the rest. It's all Steam a Seam on there and then hand stitched in place.  I also used the top of the flat sheet, you know where you would fold it down on the bed, for the bottom of the dress so it already had a hem and I didn't have to sew it myself.

I know it looks homemade and very amatuer but I'm happy with it. But, the best part is so is she!

Ribbon Organization

A few months back my husband and I took some time to organize each of our 'work rooms'. They are both in the basement and are both a mess most of the time. We do a organization day every few months. My room is a 'craft room' that also stores much of my holiday decor and baby/kid items and clothes. My room is also not as much of a disaster as his!

On this particular day I asked for his advice on how I could store my ribbons better. I have too many spools of ribbon. I use them mostly to make hair bows but I find other uses for them from time to time too. But, my collection had outgrown my original storage for them and they were everywhere and always unwinding. My wonderful husband came to the rescue and came up with an idea to utilize some empty wall space and some leftover peg board he had laying around. I am such a lucky lady! After taking this picture, he and my mom both asked me not to buy any more ribbon for a while ;)

Ribbon,ribbon,ribbon...So pretty!

 In the back there is a wire strung holding all of my holiday ribbons....

In front of that is a tiny dowel for all of my tiny ribbon spools...

You can get those metal rods to stick in the peg board like they have in stores...did you know that? I don't remember where he found them but he bought a bunch. And I have plenty of space to hang my ribbons. I have different sizes, all different textures, all different colors.....

And, plenty of patterns to choose from.

The best part is that this freed up a bunch of storage space for new craft supplies!

Princess Tea Party

This month my niece turns 6. I have no idea how we got here so fast but in a few weeks she will be six. And starting first grade. Whoa.

Because she is six she got to have her very first friend birthday party. Growing up we got a celebration with the family every year. Our grandparents and aunts, uncles and cousins would come over for dinner and cake and ice cream. We only got a birthday party with our friends three times. In first grade, when we were ten (sleepover!!!!) and when we were sixteen. This worked so well for my mother and I plan on doing the same thing. So does my sister.

My niece wanted a 'princess Kate' party for all of her friends. She is enamored with the newest member of the british royal family. So we explained to her how very popular tea time is in England, where Princess Kate lives and she wanted a princess tea party.

We were happy to oblige. And, we did it on the very cheap too!

Most of our decorations I found around my sisters house. Never underestimate what you can take off the wall and use for a party!

For starters, we told each of the girls to dress up on the invitation. I made an invitation using Word and some clip art and saved it as a picture. I then uploaded them to Walgreen's and my sister had very inexpensive invitations...this is my favorite party tip to date!


The day before the party we starting prepping and setting the stage. This is our 'tea room'. The green fabric is actually two sheer panels my sister has on the window of the playroom. My mom and I joined them together with a rubber band to make that pretty rosette and used 3M hooks to attach them to the wall. We hung some pretty beaded necklaces in the middle for some bling. The table was covered with vintage tablecloths that once belonged to my grandmother. I made the tissue paper poof balls hanging from the chandelier. My brother in law brought the chairs in after the picture :)

We decorated my sister's fireplace with the two pink sheers that go with the green ones in the previous picture. That castle is somethinng we found at Hobby Lobby for $2.80!! It was missing a few pieces and was very scratched up but with my good old Mr. Clean Magic Eraser and some scrapbook paper I fixed it all and you could never tell! The turret is actually a storage piece from the girls' bedroom my sister got at a garage sale a few years ago. The princess chair was something else they already had.

For atop the mantle I simply took some inverted bowls in varying heights and covered them with my sister's pink scarf. Then I added her tea pot from her fine china (first time it has ever been used for anything!) and some tea cups she has from her grandmother in law. The finishing touch for this was when my sister went and got her tiara from her wedding (I wore it too!) and we put that at the base of the tea pot. 

 

We all searched thrift stores and garage sales and found a great collection of different tea cups. They ranged in price from $1-$4 depending on where we were shopping. Each girl got her tea cup to take home as part of her goody bag and they were very excited when they found that out! My mom found the cute plastic plates we used. They looked like crystal candy dishes and the little girls thought they were eating on the 'good' stuff ;) Each girl also got a fascinator/hat that I made after reading about them here. 

I came up with the idea for the placecards at the last minute. Literally, after working from 10:00 on Friday morning we were putting these together at 4:00 that afternoon! I made a template for a tea bag, wroter each Princess' name on it and we made the 'tag' part (does that have a name???) with a piece of ribbon and a princess sticker.  My niece loved picking out the best seat for each of her friends!

The centerpiece on the table was the cake stand we covered with the cupcakes. The middle cup cake is sitting on an inverted wine glass to give it height. My mom and I found those cupcake wrappers for $1.80 at Hobby Lobby! They were on clearance from $5.99!!! My sister got the pics after my niece found them at the party store.

On to lunch!!! We gave each girl her own cup of veggies and dip. I wanted to put the dip right in the bottom of the veggie cup but I was overruled :) The veggie cups were another Hob Lob find on clearance in their summer section. I think we paid $1 for 8! Each girl also got an edible tea cup filled with candy that I found via Pinterest on the Disney Family website.

Of course we also had lots of finger food! The fruit pizza's were my favorite!

Three kinds of finger sandwiches were served at tea time. Peanut butter and jelly crown sandwiches. (Helpful tip here: cut the bread, meat and cheese with the appropriate cutter BEFORE assembling them...the shape was much neater that way for us at least.)

We also had turkey and Swiss cheese heart sandwiches topped with a cherry tomato for color. Ham and cheese butterfly sandwiches were our third choice. Each sandwich had it's own shape and we also used three different kinds of bread. 

There were plenty of cute conversations while nibbling on their food....

 

And, of course there was LOTS of tea drinking! Our tea was actually pink lemonade :)

We only played one party game because my niece insisted. She really wanted pin the tail on the donkey. Well, donkey's  don't come to tea parties :) so she said she wanted to play pin the diamond on the tiara instead. I  took a picture of the birthday girl and added a clip art tiara to it and uploaded it as a 16x20 print at Sam's club and cut diamonds out of colored paper. The print cost $6 and the girls thought it was so neat that it was a picture of my niece.

It was a successful party, albeit a noisy one! 12 Six year old girls can really make a room loud!! But, me, my sister and my mom survived and my niece is still talking about it two days later!







My biggest craft yet!

Whew! Finally, a chance to blog. And, something to blog about.

Summer is always jam packed with things to do and I wanted to focus on this one BIG project in my spare time. Like I have a lot of that. But, haven't you ever had about a million projects all in the works at once? Some started a little, some almost finished, some waiting to be started including all the suppplies bought. Yeah, this one was special so I wanted to get it done and done well.

I first saw a play kitchen a year or so ago on a craft blog somewhere and they began popping up frequently. They were made out of an end table or old nightstand or something like that. I thought they were pretty cute and maybe someday I would make one.

Then, came Pinterest. Bad, bad, bad, addictive Pinterest :)

It was there I saw kitchens made out of old entertainment centers. It was there that I decided I WOULD make one someday. Soon. The hunting began for the perfect piece.

Finally in April I was united with the perfect entertainment center. My mom works at a church and each spring they host a 'rummage sale' as a fundraiser. Because my mom works there, she sees everything before the sale as it comes in and is priced. The best kind of pre-sale :)

My mom sent me a picture and I told her I wanted it. Unfortunately, when we went to pick it up that night it wouldn't fit in our van:( I was literally heartbroken. The perfect piece at a reasonable price-$40!! Luckily one of my mom's volunteers who was there that night with us offered to drive the entertainment center the hour to our house in his pickup truck the following week!

This piece had several hands in on it and is filled with so much love!!

I am going to put LOTS of pictures in this post. I took pictures of the entire process. I am going to show exactly how I did everything. When researching this project I would find ideas and inspiration and wonder how they did that or what they used. There are no secrets to my projects, I won't hide anything from you! So, bear with me and here we go.

I will try and include prices on everything but I don't know exactly how much was spent but I wouldn't put it over $100. For a huge, solid, heavy, hopefully long lasting kitchen set :)


Her are the before AND after shots:

About two months after the center came to our house we finally got started on it. My husband pulled out the power tools and began taking the doors and hardware off for me...

Our daughter had lots of fun with this part of the project :)

My husband cut holes for our sink and then I started to paint....

 and, paint...

 AND, PAINT!!

This wouldn't have been so bad except right around the time we did this was when the heatwave started to choke us. Temps near 100 during the day and in the 80's at night made the painting even harder...I hate sweat! I did three coats of paint (we used paint we had leftover from the last time we painted our living room) and I almost did a fourth. Then I decided that since this was for a two year old and would be decorated so noone was going to notice anyways we stopped at three.

The oven door was spray painted using a Krylon silver metallic paint.

After the painting was complete my husband had to put everything back together. Look at all of those pieces!

The doors of the 'fridge' had been glass and we of course removed those. The hubby bought a big piece of plywood (I think) and cut it to fit. We also used it on the back of the entertainment center to close off the area where the TV would go. We paid $10 for it and it would have been much cheaper if I hadn't been so fed up with painting. I wanted one that was already white so naturally it was about three times as much as the 'natural' one.

For the stove top I got a bit creative. I bought some unfinished wooden plaques and swirlies at Jo-Ann's. I painted the swirls with the same metallic spray paint and the plaques I painted orange and black with craft paint I had on hand.

I used two large 'burners' and two smaller 'burners' just like my stove has. The knobs are wooden pieces I got at Jo-Ann's and they already had holes in the bottoms. I spray-painted them and my husband somehow attached them so they turn :)

All of the handles were added to replace the wooden knobs the center came with. I got them in a six pack for $9.99 at Target. For the stove door I moved the handle from the side to the top and moved the hinges to the bottom so it opened like a stove.

Do you see my 'tile' backsplash? :) I got a roll of contact paper at Big-Lots for $2.99 and used my Cricut to cut it out and then hand applied it all. It may be my favorite feature!

The fridge didn't really seem like a fridge to me so I glued some of those magnetic letters to it. Much better :)

The sink was a bowl we found at Wal-mart for $1 in their summer/picnic section. I like that it's red. The fixture is an old one that my husband had saved from our last update. Finally, a reason to be glad he keeps everything! The window is actually a picture of our back yard-the same thing I can see from my kitchen! I printed it as a 8x10 and my husband made a window frame for it. I made the curtains from a fat quarter and hung them on a dowel using a set of those 3M removable hooks. The basket is a last minute find I got for $4 and I am working on getting more flowers for it. My mom gave her that empty soap bottle because she told me her sink needed soap.  She is obsessed with washing her hands these days :)

The other side of the 'wall' really had me stumped. The hubby said the board wasn't strong enough to hold a shelf or anything and I was bummed. And at a loss. I finally decided to make a clock. I used a Chinet plate, some scrapbook supplies and number stickers. Perfect for the space. I used another fat quarter to match the curtains to make her a pot holder and oven mitt.

This may have been one of my most involved projects but it is currently my favorite. My daughter loves it and I hope we have it for years to come. Plus, I love to hear her tell people "mommy and daddy made me a kitchen".

A successful project if I ever saw one!

Adding two feet to my living room :)

I've finally gotten around to this little project. It only took me six months. Three months to (find time to) make it and three months to (find time to) hang it

I could have sworn I have showcased this idea before since I made one for my daughter two years ago. But, if you can find the old post, good for you :)

I have a huge wall in my living room that was designated for portraits of my children.

Emphasis on huge. And mostly empty with only two children.

I came up with this idea to fill in the space around the pictures.I have no idea when I made my daughters since I didn't write anything on it. I THINK it was somewhere around three months so that is when I did my son's.

And, then I wrote the date on the back.

Each frame cost $1 each since they are Salvation Army finds that I spray painted black to go with my living room. My daughter being the girl has pink scrapbook paper and my son therefor has blue. I'm traditional.

I originally wanted to do an actual print of each hand and foot. The foot was so easy but have you ever tried to make a handprint of an infant?? Hard! So each hand was just traced while they slept and cut out.

Such beautiful and cute keepsakes :)

Candy Arrangement

I made this for Father's Day but in reality it could be given for any type of occasion.

I wanted to give my husband something on the actual day of Father's day. I told him about his big gift a week prior since he began talking about it. I only had one idea for a gift and I didn't want to disappoint him if he wanted to pick something out for himself. So, I told him we would go to the store together and he could choose a new radio for our boat. He was pretty excited.

Still I wanted something for our daughter to give him on the morning of his day. I went to the Dollar Store and came home with the makings of an inexpensive gift.

My husband doesn't like many sweets but I got him some stuff that I've seen him munch on before. I also bought a bag of shredded paper filler. Yes, you could make this part yourself but I didn't want to! I already had the flower pot, styrofoam and those are wooden skewers I use for shish kebabs down at the bottom of the picture.

With a little bit of hot glue I attached the skewers to the candy (after measuring and cutting the skewers); the jolly ranchers and lemonheads got two skewers each. Stick them into the styrofoam, fill in with the shredded paper, add a sentiment or message and there you have it. Very inexpensive and incredibly fun!