Christmas Cookies

No Christmas is complete without plenty of cookies to enjoy. One of my husband's favorite cookies is a sugar cookie with frosting. Over the years I've tried several different recipes and several different ways to frost them. I think I'm finally getting it pefected! If you want a great tutorial, go HERE!

Gift card holders

Some more gift card holders that I made around the holidays... the tutorial is in a post further down. Sorry, the 3 year old's constant tantrums today are hindering my willingness to hunt it down again to include the link!

Bow holders

Here is another bow holder that I made for a friend of mine and her 3 girls... ironically, their commericial is on TV as I type this... sorry, random, I know. Anyway, here is proof that boy colors can be adorable and girly too :) If you want one too, please contact me. Pricing starts at $20.

 

Diaper Cake

Another diaper cake that I did for a co-worker's baby shower last weekend!

 

Hair bows

Ok, so I'm really just adding this for MY future reference... here you go, straight from the same site as below :)

Stuck...

I'm seriously stuck. I know that I want to do something about the walls in the kids' toy room and the bar area (where they currently hang ALL of their art work), but I'm not sure what. I saw these HUGE cork boards at Michaels yesterday for $19.99 - and when I say huge I'm talking 3 feet by 4 feet. It doesn't seem like a lot, but it's taller than either one of my kids. And then I could snaz it up some how... yet to be determined. Of course, I didn't buy then while I was there, and I want to go back and get them until I make up my mind, but the kids are napping right now. I secretly want to wake them up to go to Michaels, but I can count at least 10 ways that it will backfire on me big time. Not a good idea.

Instead, I'm sitting here googling ways that I can decorate the walls in the toy room and figure out some new way to display all of their art work.

I found this which could be cute, but I need it to hold more art work that that! I'd definitely make something myself, so I could make it bigger, but it has to be gender-neutral, but still cute.

Then I found this other super-cool (and cheap) idea to put some of my favorite pictures on canvas, which happens to be on sale at AC Moore this week... I saw it there today while I was looking for something else. (And I wonder why I get nothing done while the kids are at school!)

Birthday Gift Card Holder

This is a birthday gift card holder that I made for one of Kate's teachers. There is a spot for a little note card and, of course, the gift card. The tutorial for the whole project can be found at Split Coast Stampers, or by clicking here. When it calls for coin pockets, you can just make your own like I did, or google it and print out a template. I used the Party Hearty stamp kit from Stampin' Up, as well as one from the Seasons of Joy kit that I have (those are the swirls). The funky paper is Paisley Power from Stacy Claire Boyd that I bought forever ago and have been waiting to find something cute to use it on!

All packaged up ready to go - Kohl's gift card and a cute new Duke (gag!) t-shirt. Happy Birthday, Ms. Shelley!

Recipe Box

A ginormous recipe box that I made my mom as part of her Christmas present this year. It was definitely more time intensive than I expected, but it was worth it in the end!

Happy Birthday!

I'm baaaack! Well, sort of anyway. I do have a few new things in the works, but this was just a quick birthday card for a little girl in Brett's class. Same basic design as one further down the page :)

Hello? Can you hear me now?

My craft desk has been pretty lonely the last few months... life just got in the way! I'm hoping to get back into things now that the best craft holidays are coming up, so stay tuned. In the mean time, I've been busy working and parenting and all of that fun stuff, but also working on being a room mom for Kate's 2 year old class. There are a fun few links on the side for those of you that are also room parents, or looking for ideas for your kids' classes too!

Recipe Book

This was a quick recipe book that I did as a gift using the Mimosa line from SEI's April Club Kit. I tried to find pictures of each of the recipes. For the recipes without pictures, I did various designs on the back. The plain white album is also from SEI.

 

 

 

 

Switch-flops stoage problem...

So, I don't know if you've heard of these great flip-flops called Switch Flops. They really are some of the coolest things ever. Basically, it's like having 10 pairs of flip flops for a little more than the price of 1! The bottoms (the basic flip flop) run at about $35 and then the tops velcro onto the flip-flops, and they run at about $10 each. So, I have all of these flip-flop tops and nowhere to store them, until now! Ta da! I'm pretty impressed with myself. Once I work out the kinks, I'm going to make one for my mom & sisters too.

cakes and cards

Here is a little glimpse at what I've been up to lately. This is definitely the season for parties - bridal showers, baby showers, and birthday parties! Our weekends seem all-consumed with all of these parties, but I don't mind. It's always fun to catch up with family and old friends :)



This paper cake is for my sister's bridal shower at Fearrington in a few weeks. I'm co-hosting the shower with several of our aunts. The food is absolutely delicious! I can't wait! Anyway, we decided that we didn't really need to do favors, but I still wanted to do a little something. Each of these "cake boxes" has 5 Hershey's Nuggets inside, wrapped in coordinating paper as well. It looks tedious, but was actually really easy to do. I did the whole thing in front of the TV for a few consecutive nights. I figured that I might as well put those 2 hours each night to good use! The pattern for the cake slices can be found here by scrolling down and clicking on the link for the PDF. Just print these on your favorite paper and follow the cutting and folding directions. The paper that I used is by Stemma - the lighter one is Teal & Black Daisies and the darker one is Teal & Black Midnight Garden. I love the colors together - plus the wedding colors are a (darker) teal and black. The stamp is from some random wedding stamp set at Michael's - sorry - I dont remember the name of the set. I used the scallop punch from Stampin' Up! The bow is from Michael's too - I don't have the patience to make bows, ever.



This is a diaper cake for my friend's shower this coming weekend. It's actually the first diaper cake I've ever made, and I think it turned out pretty well. I usually buy them from my VERY talented friend, Sarah. You can buy them too by clicking here! Anyway, I didn't get my act together early enough to ask Sarah to do it. Oh well. My friend has a dinosaur theme for her nursery, and I love blue and brown together, so that's what it is. I bought the wooden dinosaurs from Michael's and painted them myself to match the ribbon that I found. I actually did make this bow, which is why it's not nearly as nice on the bow on the other cake :)



This is another birthday card using the Party Hearty! set from Stampin' Up! It's for a little boy's 3rd birthday. He likes cars, just like Brett, so I had to find a way to incorporate some cars onto the card! The solid paper is all from Bazzill and the cars paper is Sandylion's Rush Hour. I copied this design!



Last one - this is a card for baby shower that I'm going to this weekend. The paper is all from SEI's "Doodley Doo Boy" line. The stamps are from Autumn Leaves - Mindy's Zoo. I copied the idea here!

As you can tell, I've been stumped for original ideas lately... thank God for the internet so that I can be inspired :)

Oh, speaking of the internet - I'll share one more wonderful thing that I found yesterday. I'm always trying to find coordinating envelopes to go with the 4x6 cards that I make. I stumbled upon this - a site to download the PDF envelope template to print on any paper that you wish! LOVE it!

Happy Birthday, Ms. Shelley!

One of Brett's teachers celebrated a birthday last week, and the parents thought it would be nice if the class went in together to get her a giftcard to Starbucks since she loves coffee. Whow wouldn't love coffee working with 2 year olds all day?! I designed this little card for the class to give her. The paper and ribbon is all from SEI's Spring line and the stamps are from Stampin' Up's Party Hearty. Brett was so excited to give Ms. Shelley the card this morning. He didn't even cry at drop off! Maybe we need to bring something for Ms. Shelley every day!

I {heart} organizing!

I know everyone out there thinks that I'm nuts, but I really love to organize things - it is much different than cleaning, trust me!



I finally put away all of the Christmas wrapping *stuff* - I went and bought storage containers for shirt boxes and Christmas bags and Birthday bags and Baby bags and Wedding bags and whatever other bags I had floating around in that closet! The pink, blue, and green bins are from Target (of course)!



Shoe organizers re-purposed for various craft supplies and ribbon.





My old shelf from my college apartment, along with some jars from the Teeter... I like things sorted by colors. I think it looks nice :)

Another baby card...

I think this is the last one for a little while... we're entering the season of the bridal shower :)

Baby card

Another simple baby card using "In the Stars" from Stampin' Up!