Yarn Wrapped Letter with Flower Embellishment

I needed a thank you gift that went beyond just a card.  My neighbor and friend, Holly makes the most beautiful and cozy knitted blankets and I've been so blessed to receive 3 of these blankets from her.  I wanted to do something in return so I decided instead of just a card, I would make her something with MY crafty talents for her to enjoy!

Her last name starts with a P and now she has something cute to hang up.  I actually stalked her Pinterest boards and saw that she pinned something similar.  Perfect gift!
(I also snuck in a gift card and a written thank you note which she didn't notice until after I left because she loved this letter so much!)

What do you think?

Baby Girl Projects: Easy Baby Blankets

You can never have enough blankets when babies are around!  I love having lots especially for variety in all the dozens of photos I take of my cute little munchkins!

Here are two blankets i whipped up one morning:

First, I got this crocheted blanket at a vintage market and I wanted to try lining it with flannel to make it warmer and more cozy.  I found this cute fabric at JoAnn’s (couldn’t find it online) and did my best to cut out a big piece to fit the blanket - allowing enough of the edges to fold under.  Then I just sewed the flannel piece directly to the crocheted blanket.

Second, I made a flannel backed blanket.  I also found this cute cotton chevron fabric at JoAnn’s and got a coordinating piece of flannel to put on the back (couldn’t find them online).  They are super easy to make too!  Just get 1 1/2 yards each of 2 coordinating patterns.  Lay them right sides together and then trim your edges so the blanket is nice and straight.  You can make curved corners if you’d like—just use a bowl for your curve template.  Then sew up the edge with the fabrics right sides together—leave part of an edge about 8 inches un-sewn.  Then use that hole and turn the blanket right sides out.  Topstitch around the entire blanket, and iron it when you are all done! I decided to topstitch it using a blanket stitch that I have on my sewing machine. 

If you are looking for more baby blanket ideas, I posted a few others a while back.  Thanks for stopping by!

Baby Girl Projects: Easy Baby Burp Cloths

Some babies don’t spit up much (Luke) and some babies spit up a lot (Sam)!  I’m not sure which way this baby will go on that, but it’s better to be prepared so I made ten super cute burp cloths to take on the task.

These are super easy to make and they are so fun to customize and make cute!

Here are all 10 of the cloths I made!

I made 7 burp cloths using wide strips of fabric:
I didn’t need a tutorial for these (they are pretty simple), but if you do, I found this really great one on The Petite Lemon blog  I would highly recommend pre-washing the pre-fold diapers before you sew them.  They shrink up a lot in the wash the first time.  You can pre-wash all the fabric you use, too, but I’m super lazy and don’t do that part. If you don’t pre-wash the diapers, though, you will likely regret it later when you wash them.  I did not iron the diapers after I washed them.  That will just stretch them out again, and I don’t think it’s necessary.

The other 3 cloths, I sewed ribbon on the ends.  Use a lighter to seal the ends of the ribbon, and cut it longer than you think you need because the diapers will stretch as you sew and you want to make sure the ribbon goes all the way to the edges. 


Some people don’t like the burp cloths with fabric doing down the middle because they say it’s less absorbent—if you are in that camp, then the ribbon edged ones are the way to go because they leave most of the middle plain so that the diaper part is catching all the spit up. I don’t mind either way, and I love a good excuse to use a lot of different cute fabrics!

If you are looking for a simple baby gift, this is a great one.

Next Up: Easy Baby Blankets

DIY Earrings

I pulled out my jewelry supplies this week and got busy!  My goal was to make some earring for some new shirts I got for our upcoming cruise, and once I got started and just couldn’t stop!  Making jewelry is really fun and I want to make a whole lot more.

Here’s what I made this week:

{sorry about the distracting background, I didn’t realize it would look so busy until I was editing them!}

These are so cute and I love the way they look, but seed beads are of the devil!   

These were actually pendants for necklaces that I got when Robert’s Craft closed.  I thought they would make cute earrings…and they do!

And everyone’s favorite flower earrings…I’ve made these before and they are super easy.  I made 25 pairs in about 10-15 minutes! 

I have a lot more beads to make into fantastic creations, I’m just waiting on more jump rings and ear hooks, etc from china ;)  If you are looking for cheap supplies, there are lots of Etsy stores that sell from outside the US that sell bulk jewelry supplies for cheap {it just takes a few weeks to get to you, usually!} 

If you are looking for a good start to jewelry making, I found a really good series about learning the techniques at My Girlish Whims.

Birdhouse Village and other Spring Decor

I always feel kinda cheated out of celebrating Spring when Easter is in March.  April is still all Spring to me, so I am leaving up this stuff all month! {ok, I might take down the bunnies…}

I’ve been working on a very cute project that really stretched my creativity! I haven’t done something like this in a long time.  It is not as easy as it looks to coordinate 8 different birdhouses using different patterned papers, and several different paint colors and have them look like they all belong together!  I had to re-do a few houses along the process when I made some dumb choices, but they turned out super cute! 

I used some small candle holders and a bowl {from the thrift store} to help give my houses some different heights.  

I LOVE how it turned out!  Such a happy thing to look at when I go into my living room! 

I’ve also had the mantle done for a couple weeks, and we recently put up some new bamboo shades on the windows to help with our overbearing sunlight situation. 

Here’s the mantle:

Mantles are not my strong suit, but I think this one turned out cute enough. I used paper doilies from hobby lobby for the garland. My mom crocheted those bunnies for the boys the last two Easters.

And here are the new shades! I can’t even begin to tell you how much I love these! Our living room gets SO MUCH LIGHT and we were in dire need of a way to block out light on super sunny days! Now we can pull these babies down and watch TV or play the XBOX without getting a headache from all the glare and brightness!

Combine all these things together and I’m loving the living room right now! It’s so fresh and happy! Now I just wish I could figure out the furniture {blah} and fix the gallery wall behind the couch {not pictured for a reason!} Happy Spring!!

Fabric Coil Easter Baskets

Happy Easter Weekend!  I’ve finally finished my big project for Easter…these baskets for my boys!

I used this tutorial by V and Co. on Moda Bake Shop as a guideline, but I didn’t follow it exactly. 

First, I wanted my baskets bigger.  When I was all finished, the bottom diameter was around 9.5 inches {about 10 coils}.  The basket was not quite 4.5 inches deep {about 8 coils tall), and the handle was almost 21.5 inches long.  I used nearly 12 yards of cording per basket.  I found the cording at Hobby Lobby in a box {near the trims} that you have the fabric station cut into the right yardage for you. There were 3 or 4 fatnesses and I got a middle sized cording.  There was a really fat size that I’d love to try , but I’m not sure it would be easy to get it to blend where the ends are on the basket.   I can’t tell you how much fabric I used.  I was using a bunch of remnants and fat quarters from my stash and didn’t really figure out how much I used in total. 

Also, in the tutorial she sewed all the coils together with a needle and thread!! Who has time for that??  I hot glued all the coils together once the fabric was all wrapped around it, then I hand-stitched the handles on for stability.

One more change from the tutorial—she folded over her strips, I left mine wide {1.5 inch about} and I think that helped the wrapping and sewing strips together parts go faster. 

I started gluing about halfway through so I could see how the patterns were working together.  The blue one {my first} basket took about 3 times as long to make than the second basket since I was learning and figuring everything out.  The second basket only took 2-3 hours and went a lot faster. 

I’m SO happy with how these turned out!  I wanted to make them ever since I found the tutorial last year.  It’s probably too late to make these this year, but pin this and make them next year for sure!   

Happy Easter!  Can’t wait to see what Sam does during the Egg Hunt this weekend!

Tutorial Tuesday: Washi Tape Magnets {No Washi Tape Required!}

I don’t have any washi tape… I already have way too much trouble staying away from the remnant bin, the scrapbook paper, and the ribbon isles at the craft stores!  I can’t add washi tape to my list of “things to hoard.” at least not yet ;) 

I do, as previously mentioned, have a lot of scrapbook paper.  We are talking about a stack at least 2 feet tall!  That is a lot of paper for someone who does digital scrapbooking!  Maybe that’s not as bad as some of you, but I think it’s pretty bad.  And seriously unorganized…but that’s another story.

Good thing there a lots and lots of other projects that use cute scrapbook paper that I can justify my addiction with! 

This project is a great way to use up your scraps if you’ve got a lot of little scraps lying around.  This project is quick, too.  I whipped out more than a dozen of these magnets in less than half an hour.  Here’s just a few:

All you need is some cute scrapbook paper {or you can use washi tape if you are a washi-hoarder}, some adhesive magnets {sheets or roll}, and scissors. 

If you go with adhesive-backed magnet tape like i did, they will be a little curvy when you cut them to the size you want. 

Just bend them back the other way and then let them sit on the fridge for a little while to flatten out a bit.  If you skip this step your paper will wrinkle.  Much like the white adhesive-protective paper on the magnets here.

Next, cut your paper to size.

Remove the white protective paper and then stick on your cute paper.

Rub it on the table {cute paper side down} to help secure it to the magnet. 

Now cut some rugged edges and you’re done!  

You could modge-podge over the paper to give it a little more protection.  Me and modge-podge don’t always play nice, so I skipped that step this time. 

That’s it!  A quick little way to jazz up your fridge!      

More washi-tape magnet inspiration~  My favorite ones are here and I originally saw them here

Valentine’s Day Shirts for Boys

I love making shirts for my boys, so I couldn’t resist coming up with something for Luke to wear to his Preschool Party. 

It took a while to think of a good idea for the design, but I saw phrase “Loads of Love” on a stamp once with a pick-up  truck and hearts falling out.  {I think it was a Stampin’ Up stamp that my friend had.}  So I found a good picture of a truck for an example and drew it in Photoshop and then added little hearts in the back and falling off the truck.  I used the font Lemondrop for the wording. 



Sam’s shirt was a bit trickier.  I couldn’t decide what I wanted to do.  I thought about “Heart Breaker” or “stud muffin” but wasn’t in love with either.  Then I thought of Love Boat!  Perfect!  Drew up a little boat and added some hearts to it also!  Decided to nix the actual wording—figured the boat with hearts is pretty self explanatory.  I will have to snap a picture of Sam wearing his shirt tomorrow—he was way too grumpy to attempt it today! 

I got these red t-shirts at Walmart for $3.88/ea and then washed them.  It’s important to wash them since they may shrink a little after the first wash.  Unless you plan never to wash the stenciled …

I cut the stencils using my Sure-Cuts-A-Lot program and my Cricut and I used Freezer Paper for the stencils.  Be sure to cut out the right side.  The shiny side is what gets ironed onto the shirt, so make sure the picture isn’t reversed when that side goes down.


Then a couple coats of Tulip Fabric paint and let it dry overnight. 

In the morning I carefully pulled off the freezer paper—the most annoying part.

I need to remember next time to make any skinny lines much thicker.  Skinny lines have a bigger tendency to bleed and are a lot harder to remove after you’ve painted.  I had some trouble with bleeding and getting the freezer paper off because of my skinny lines.



I’ve made the skinnier lines thicker in the downloads, so if you attempt these I’m hoping I’ve fixed the problem.

That’s it!  Cute shirts for my cute boys!



Now my Valentine’s Day gift to you…my files for these stencils! Hopefully you can figure out how to load these into your various programs and cut them with your electronic cutters.  I used SCAL with my Cricut…so if you don’t have those, I won’t be able to help you with any questions {I don’t know anything about the Silhouette, for example, so I can’t help you there!} I’ve made the skinny lines a bit fatter, so hopefully you’ll have a little better luck and not have any bleeding like I did!

Loads of Love
Love Boat

These files are for PERSONAL USE ONLY! You can not sell these images or use them for anything being sold.  Happy Valentine’s Day!!

Luke’s Valentine’s Day Mailbox for Preschool

Luke’s preschool teacher requested that parents help their children decorate a box to hold all their Valentines they will receive at their party today.  I had to remind myself that it was Luke’s box and not mine, but I got it started for him and let him decorate the rest ;)

Found the perfect box

Cut off the extra flaps

Covered it in Red duct tape and hot glued cute paper to the inside

Then I pulled out everything I could think of and helped Luke decorate his box. 

He was pretty excited!

Foam stickers are awesome for this kind of thing! 

To keep the top from flapping open too much, I hot glued a heart button onto another button {to help it stick out} and then glued it onto the box

Then I taped a ribbon loop for a closure and made Luke practice opening and closing the box…it took a few tries for him to figure out the best way to close it and get the loop off again. 

I think it turned out great!  I thought he needed some more “boy” stickers so I let him put on some more of those this morning:

I’ll show you what his Valentine’s looked like in a bit…I want to see what he brings home from everyone else before I post them! So look for that post later today!  I’m putting up all my Valentine’s Day posts today—nothing like waiting until the last minute!!