Boys' Birthday Invites - Sneak Peak

My boys have birthdays that are one month apart.  Sometimes we decide to combine their parties into one shindig and meet in the middle.  This year is one of those years.  School starts back this week (on my oldest son's birthday as a matter of fact,) and my boys have been hugely fascinated with going fishing this summer, so in order to change it up this year we are renting a lake house somewhat locally and having family up for a little birthday dinner.  The boys have been allowed 2 friends a piece to come fishing with them for the day.

Today I sat down with my Silhouette to finally get the invites finished since the party is next week.  I am seriously not into waiting to the last minute like this, but there were a few issues getting the reservations nailed down, so everyone was given a tentative date for the party and now that it is confirmed the invites will be delivered (some by hand.) 

This is a little sneak peak at what you might expect from their party.  I'll post pics sometime next week of some of the other details. 

I hate wasting paper, especially cardstock, so I mixed up the invites and used the cut outs, and the negatives of the design for the cards.

The back of the envelopes.  Every invite has a different fish (and what is fun is they are all fish that my kids can identify as fish they have caught or have seen someone catch.)

Wild & Wonderful Origami Book Review

My 6-year-old son has had a mild obsession with origami since we checked some books out from the library a while back.  The library books were a huge fail as they were very confusing directions for us.  Having never attempted origami I needed some pictures that showed more step-by-step instead of just a bunch of arrows and words.  When little man saw this book in the store he begged me to buy it so we could give it another shot.  Having a 40% off coupon I gave in.

First off, this book comes with 50 pages of origami paper that is already colored and with faces, etc. for the animals to be made in this book which made this more fun for them, so I give the book an A+ on that front!

The pictures in the book are MUCH more helpful than the ones I experienced from the library books.  They have a difficulty level grade at the top of each project page, too, which helped.  We started with the lowest level possible.

Even though the instructions were much easier to follow my little man was still too overwhelmed to try them on his own, so he had me make some for him.  I think tomorrow I will have him try with me.  He was so excited about the little animals that we made today that he carried them to his grandma's to show them off.

I think this book did a lot of things right in making origami more attainable to the inexperienced, and to children.  Depending on the age of your child, though, this may not be a craft you can just sit your child down with for independent play.  It would make a good family bonding experience, though.  Little man has already made requests for what he wants us to make tomorrow.  I think we will get our money's worth out of this book.

Paper Airplane Races

Do you remember flying paper airplanes as a kid?  Folding them different ways and seeing who could come up with the best airplane?  Well, me and the boys checked out a book from the library that taught us the physics behind the fun.  Today we thought we would have a little paper airplane experiment and learn the different ways that lift, thrust, drag, and gravity effect the flight of the airplane.  Of course they don't remember them quite in those terms, but they did learn what makes the airplane go higher or nose dive, what makes it loop and what makes it go straight.  Elementary physics - check. :)

Just in case you can't remember how to fold a paper airplane here is a little refresher in pictures.  I think I missed one step in the pictures, but hopefully this will get you on track so you can have your own paper airplane physics lesson fun.

Note, the pilot in my son's plane?  They also learned about how far he could fly before autoeject takes place.  :)

We made our planes out of heavy duty cardstock because we wanted to anticipate the nose dives and hopefully save the plane for a little while.  After doing several run throughs with the plane folded like the above pictures we made a few modifications including adding a paperclip and trying it closer to the nose versus middle versus rear; folding up the sides of the wings; and cutting slits in the back.  We tried the rear slits folded up and folded down for different effects.

Cheap, easy, educational fun at its best.

**Dragonfly Designs Giveaway ends 8/2!  Don't miss out.**

Super Mario Matchup Game With Free Printable

I'm not really sure how this idea came to me at this point.  Somehow in the midst of redoing the boys' room in a Super Mario theme this game idea just popped up, and the next thing you know I am working on it at my kitchen table.  It is a little twist on the old game, Memory, we all played as a child.  The only real difference aside from the pictures is that if you get one of the "bad guy" cards you lose a turn.

If you would like to make your own Super Mario Matchup Game this is what you will need:

• foam board
• printer & paper
• craft knife such as Xacto and scissors
• decoupaging medium like Modge Podge
• Mario Game Printable

The first thing you need to do is print out the free printable from the link above.  Then you are going to cut all of the images out into squares roughly the size of the question mark boxes.  Next you need to use your craft knife to cut out your squares from the foam board.  If the edges are rough you can use your scissors to straighten them some.

Now you will glue all of the question mark boxes onto one side of all of those squares.  I believe there are 18 pairs in all.  The character squares will go on the opposite side of all of these squares so each one is two-sided.  Set up an assembly line and enlist your children to help cut out the squares (using safety scissors) and glue the paper to the squares.  Crafting knives are extremely sharp, so I would advise you do that part, though.  When all of the squares have had a chance to dry you will put a top coat of your decoupaging medium onto both sides of the squares (letting one side dry before coating the second side.)  The red color tends to bleed some so make sure to only do one light coat across it.

When they have all dried it is time for your kids to have fun!  And they aren't even glued to a video game, woohoo!

P.S.  Don't forget to check out our giveaway for some awesome handcrafted jewelry!  Entries end August 2!

When Life Gives You Lemons

As some of you may have noticed I have recently added to my etsy shop.  I have been doing etched glass mirrors and such, and started doing some tree of life stuff for custom orders.  Well, I had several custom orders come in this week, and one of the mirrors was giving me a particularly large amount of trouble.  No matter what I did the thing just did not want to etch properly.  I was not very pleased with the way it turned out so I set it aside.  I somehow resisted the urge to chunk it in the garbage despite my extreme frustration at that point.  After completing another tree of life (which turned out beautifully I might add) and after letting the mirror sit for two days, I looked at it in a little different light.  Go ahead and cue the spot lights and the angel singing in the background, because I had an idea.  Shocking.  I decided rather than waste this I would just paint the frame with the off white paint I used for the Super Mario TV Stand.  Add a little scrapbook paper, and turn it into something completely different.

This is what the mirror frame looked like before...

Pretty enough in its own right, but why not capitolize on my own misfortunate.  In this case, when life gives you lemons..... make extremely early Christmas decorations. 



Some time later remind me to tell you about how God spoke to me through this incident and how I learned a little bit more about myself in the process.  In the meantime, though, I think it turned out pretty cute don't you?  What do you do when you have majorly frustrating craft disasters? 

Bird Feeders

I signed the kids up for summer reading at our library and during our weekly library trip I decided to pick up a book on birds that are indigenous to our area.  It's just a simple field guide with lots of pictures to help you identify what you are seeing.  We have the most excellent vantage point to see the birds as our kitchen sits high up and there are trees right outside our sitting area window.  We have seen so many kinds of birds living here that I had never even noticed before, so I decided the kids might like to make some little bird feeders to hang on the limbs right outside our window and watch for the birds.  (Yes, I do know it is the wrong season technically for bird feeders.)  I thought it would be neat to do this project twice a year to see the different types of birds we get during warm and cold weather.  The field guide also tells us which birds are year round, migratory, summer, or winter birds for our area.

All you need is:

• an empty toilet paper or paper towel roll tube
• peanut butter
• bird seed
• field guide for local birds

Coat the paper towel roll tubes with peanut butter all the way around.

 

Then roll the coated tube in bird seed or mash the seeds into the peanut butter.

Now just find a nice viewing area and keep your book in that area.

See how good that view is??  Unfortunately, we still have yet to see any birds feeding.  We have had bad thunderstorms every night this week and it started pouring about an hour after we put our feeders up.  They are still up, but they haven't been needing as much to eat I'm sure as the worms are probably plentiful with this wet weather.  This may not be the best time of year in retrospect, but I think my middle child is learning a lesson in patience from this.  He has probably been the most excited of the kids about seeing the birds, too.

The birds finally came.  This is a tufted titmouse.  Bet you never heard of that before.  ;)

 

Invincible Star Gamer Hooks!

We are in the middle of a little redecorating and decluttering of the boys' room.  After 4 years in this house they decided it was time for something new.  They want Super Mario which is fine with me being a child of the 80's and all.  The room is far from complete, but I do have a project I would like to share with you in the meantime.

We found these great wooden star hangers at Hobby Lobby which seemed perfect to me and the kids loved the idea of painting them themselves. 

What would make kids love this more?  Glow-in-the-dark paint of course!  This is what we used.  It can be used on fabric or mixed up to 25% with craft paint, so there are tons of fun options of things to make with this stuff!

This was a great opportunity for me to teach the kids how to paint, and not a single drop ended up on their clothes!

Now we have these great little star hooks to hang on their wall.  They have decided it would be a great place to hang their Nintendo DS game cases and that sounds like an awesome idea to me!!  Maybe I will spend less time having to help them track them down before we hit the road next time.

Handkerchief Hem Bandana Top or Skirt Tutorial

So you have waited until the last minute to make something for your daughter to wear to that July 4th BBQ and you are strapped for cash.  No worries.  I have a quick and easy solution and your little princess will strut her stuff Americana fashion, and it will cost you less than $5 to boot.  The instructions listed are for 12-18 month size and I will show you how to make a top or a skirt from the same pieces.

What you will need:

• 2 bandanas
• 7/8 in. grosgrain ribbon
• 1/2 in. wide elastic
• thread
• sewing machine

The first thing you need to do is fold your bandanas in half so that they form a triangle like so, and iron them. 

Next you will unfold the bandana, and cut along the fold line left in your bandana.  This cut does not have to be perfectly straight at this point.  This is a very forgiving garment.  Do this with both of your bandanas.

After you have cut both of your bandanas in half you should have 4 pieces.

Next, you are going to take your first bandana half and measure in from each end 5 inches and cut off the end triangles.  It should look like this when you are done...

You will repeat this with all 4 halves.  Then you will take your two matching color bandana halves and place them right sides facing.  Using a half inch inseam you will sew down those short sides where you just cut and finish the ends with either a zigzag stitch or a serger.  These are the only seams you will have to finish.  Repeat with the other two halves and trim the excess.

Next you are going to put one of your bandanas inside the other centering the seam so that you will have 4 triangles showing.  Tip:  The color that is showing on the outside at this point is the one that will be underneath when complete.  You are now looking at the top or skirt turned inside out basically.  Pin the two pieces together around the straight edge.

Now you are going to sew a basting stitch around the top edge just to hold the two layers together while you finish.  This seam will not show so it doesn't have to be perfect.  Mine is terribly crooked.

Now you are going to iron down that top edge all the way around, where you just stitched, by a half inch, and then fold it over again an inch and iron again.  This will be your elastic casing.

Edge stitch around the casing leaving about a one inch opening to feed the elastic through in a few minutes.

Measure your child around her chest for the top or around the waist for the skirt and subtract 1 in. to get the length of elastic you need.  Making the top my elastic is 16 in. long.  Now you are going to feed the elastic through the elastic casing using a safety pin.

When you have finished putting the elastic through the casing you are going to overlap the ends of the elastic by about a half inch or so and zigzag them together.

Now you will put the elastic up into the casing all the way and close up the opening and turn it right side out.  This is what it looks like now.  If you are making the skirt you are done.  Put it on your child and enjoy.

If you are making the top, you will need to get out your grosgrain ribbon.  I cut mine about 7.5 inches long each.  Then you need to seal the ends of your ribbon with either Fray Check or with heat just enough to melt the edge of each end.  Decide where you want to place the straps and pin them.

Stitch across the top edge of your bandana top to secure the strap in place.  Do this for the front and back of both straps.

Now put it on your little angel and let her show her American pride.

Footprint Door Mat How-To

I have been seeing all these pins on Pinterest of monogrammed door mats so I thought I would change that up a little bit.  My last name will be the same forever, but my kids are growing way too fast so why not preserve this moment.  I have always been a sucker for baby feet, so the Footprint Door Mat was born.

What I used:

• $6 Wal-Mart door mat
• Black acrylic craft pain
• Foam brushes
• Paper
• Scanner, Silhouette Cameo, and vinyl (optional)
• If you do not have a Silhouette freezer paper will work also.

First off you will need to prep and paint those precious baby tootsies.  You might want to have a bucket of water close by or do this in the bathroom because it can get messy.  We did one foot at a time.  My boys loved it!

Next, you will have them step directly down onto a piece of white paper.

You will probably have some lighter spots like in the photo above.  If you are using a Silhouette for this you will want to take your black paint and paint in those light spots so that it is a more solid color.  It makes the next step much easier.

Silhouette instructions

When you have finished painting them in, let the paint dry.  Scan them into your computer if using your Silhouette.  When you open your Silhouette software you will click the open folder and find the location you saved your footprints to.  You may have to change the file type in the drop down menu to .jpg to find it.  Then click Open.  When the footprints show up in your Silhouette Studio software you will go to the top menu and find Object.  Then go down to where it says Trace.  On the right side will pop up the trace options.  Select your trace area.  Then choose "trace outer edge."  When you have done this you can select your media if you haven't already and load it into the Silhouette.  Once you set your blade to the appropriate setting you are ready to cut!  You are going to use the negative portion for your stencil so use your Silhouette hook and peel out the inner foot print.  Then you will transfer your stencil onto the rug.  It may not stick firmly if you are using a highly textured rug like the one I used, but just hold it down as you pull off the transfer paper and it will work. :)

Once you have your stencil secured to the mat you will take your foam brushes and paint those feet!  I coated them several times to make sure to get it good and saturated and dark getting into the textured spots.  Peel it off, and Voila!

The great thing is now you have the footprints saved and scanned into your computer!  Think of all the great crafts you can do with them now!  They would make great grandparent gifts!

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