I'm on an ornament kick!

I have mentioned before just how much I love Chloe (my Silhouette).  I never get tired of playing around and learning new things to make with her.  We recently became addicted to glass bulb ornaments.  I made them for my kids' teachers for their Christmas gifts as well as the people I visit teach (for church) and a gift exchange party I went to.  Of course, I couldn't leave my kiddos out, they got one too.  I took an ornament tutorial I found on pinterest and changed it up a little.  I used vinyl on transparency paper instead of paper like the original did.  I then added some of the glittery, fake snow from the craft store.  My favorite was the baby Jesus in his manger.  I also loved the snowman, and felt like he really wanted to be on my tree, but I let him go to his new home ;). I also discovered that it is impossible for me to take a good picture with clear ornaments!  I did add ribbon to the tops of the other ornaments, but forgot to take pictures of them that way before they were given away.  Oops

Photo boards

     Wow, I have been MIA lately!  I am here, I promise!  The Christmas season always leaves me so busy, just like everyone else.  I did get some crafting in there thank goodness!  My sanity needed it! 

   I adore these boards that I made for the sibling gift exchange for my hubby and my side of the family.  I found the tutorial here.  They were so stinkin easy!

The boards really are straight, but for some reason every time I took a picture they looked crooked.  I am so far from being a professional photographer that it is sad really lol.

I fell in love with them and almost didn't want to send them, but decided that I will definitely be making some for myself very very soon!

It was super inexpensive to make, and I learned how to make the felt rolled flowers for it too.  I really couldn't believe just how simple these were to make and just how beautiful they turned out.  Although, as I am typing this I just realized I forgot to attach the ribbon before mailing them.  Oh man!  That is the story of my life though, lol.  I guess I should go call some siblings and explain that.

Love this saying!

Hi there, All! Hope you are having a great weekend. I spent my Saturday in bed with a lovely migraine. I hate headaches! Oh well, I was able to at least move around and clean up my kitchen today, so that was an improvement.
I don't know about you, but I am addicted hardcore to Pinterest. Don't know what that is? It is a great new free site that allows you to pin anything from all over the wonderful web. See a recipe and want to try it? Just pin it! A cute craft? A great organization tip or even a place you would love to take a vaca? You guessed it, pin it! It is so fun, and I have been spending way too much time pinning instead of creating!

I found this quote on Pinterest, but when I went back to put a link discovered that I never actually pinned it. Weird. Anyway, I had a black frame sitting around (another saved from the DI bag where the hubby tried to stick it when he thought I wasn't paying attention). It was really heavy duty, for an award he won years ago. I can still be proud of him right?;) He didn't want it anymore, so I swooped in to save the poor thing! A little vinyl, some scrapbook paper and we are good as new!

Good ol Daddy's day

I went simple and cheap frugal for Father's day this year.  I was having a difficult time getting my brain in the mood to celebrate after our horrendous mother's day, but I wanted to do something.  I have the worlds best hubby and we both have pretty great dads too, so I had to let them know how thankful we are that we have them in our lives.  I found the tags for the Padre's mugs on a linky over at Tatertots and Jello on a weekend wrap up party, but can't seem to find them again.  If anyone finds them please let me know so I can give credit where it is due!  They were too cute! 

This was my first time trying glass etching, so it was a new experience that I now am addicted to.  (The hubby thanks you Michael's for supplying us with yet another addiction!) ;)

The mugs I got at the dollar store, they are super strong and sturdy.  Try saying that 3 times fast!  It is hard to see the writing, so I will tell you what it says.  For Clayton's dad I put "Grandpa" with a picture of an elk since he is an avid hunter.  For my dad it says "K7BSU" with a heart since he is an avid Ham radio guy.  I am sure that is the technical term for that too lol. Also my dad is right handed, and the father in law is left, so I tried to put the vinyl on accordingly.  Of course, the vinyl was cut using my Silhouette to make the stencil. I filled them up with Reese's pieces to go with the tags of course.  I think they turned out pretty stinkin cute!

Putting the kidlets to work!

Ok, parents, its that time of year again!  Summer break... sometimes fun, sometimes frustrating, and all to often a little bit boring!  At least it gets that way at my house.  I don't know why they are so bored, but I am tired of hearing those dreaded words: "there is nothing to do!"  So in comes my summer plan to beat the boredom and make my kids my slaves have a clean house doing it!
My hubby came up with the idea of a chore chart with a small incentive.  I have never been one to believe that kids should be paid an allowance for doing chores.  They live here too, so why should they get paid is my philosophy.  It was time to cave give in and give it a try at least.  It isn't much, just a quarter a day for getting their chores done, and if they do it on all 6 mandatory days a whopping $2!  (they are still young so it works for us).  Clayton suggested something simple, something easy, something boring.  But I had big plans and was going to put Chloe to work to make it happen.  Chloe is what I named my Silhouette by the way, so she was going to get it done!  I wish I could say that I stuck with the extravagant, adorable ideas I came up with, but I didn't.  I went easy and cheap because I already had everything on hand for this one!  I love when that happens!  So, it may be simple, but I am loving it!

I took a piece of foamboard I bought months ago at the dollar store, some ribbon, hot glue, vinyl, clothes pins, scrapbook paper, mod podge, distressing ink (which I may or may not have gone a little crazy with) and most important, Chloe.

The foam board was huge and since I only have 3 kidlets, I cut a piece off.  I would say it was about a third. 

Its pretty self explanatory by the pics, but I have to point out that everything was cut using my Silhouette.  I measured my clothes pins, and created a sheet of rectangles that size for the cover for them and them just mod podged them on.  So simple! The circles were also cut by the Silhouette.  I  just put the sheet of them through the Silhouette with the ink pen in and my chosen font because my hand writing is not so cute.  I have to say that I love it.  It is simple, but gets the job done and is easy for the kids to understand also.  Now lets hope that their enthusiasm lasts longer than a couple days!

Mother's day... finally!

When I saw the saying for this craft, I knew it was the one! It couldn't fit anyone better than my sweet mother in law! My mother's day was spent in the hospital, as was the couple of weeks leading up to it, so my gift for my amazing mother in law was way late.  (Sorry again Marie)  I made the vinyl on my beloved Silhouette (her name is Chloe) and put it on a piece of beadboard I had laying around (I love ReStore).  So this project was free... well, sort of, the Silhouette was bought by the hubby for Christmas and the beadboard I bought a while back for another project.  Anyway, I am counting it as free. Oh, I also hung it with a piece of red ribbon that I also had on hand!

Introducing the Potato Head family

I absolutley love this project that has been in the works for months around here. I wanted to put something on my car like everyone has the stick figures, but I was looking for something a little different. We are HUGE Toy Story fans at our house, I have loved it since number one, before I had kids or an excuse to watch it. Well, I watched it with my nephews, but really I just loved it! Now the tradi
tion has continued with my kidlets and I love it.
So enter the potato head family. I was so excited when the idea came to me! For those that live under a rock don't know, Mr and Mrs Potato Head adopt the little green aliens on Toy Story 2 after Mr Potato Head saves their lives. How perfect is that?! There are three aliens and I just happen to have 3 kidlets. It is fate!
The project would've gone faster if I wasn't so lazy busy. I found some coloring sheets of the characters, and imported them into the silhouette software where I traced them. Unfortunatley, there was a ton of cleaning up to do, especially with the aliens. I couldn't find one of Mrs Potato head so I basically had to create the whole thing from scratch. I started with Mr Potato Head's shape for her too and then just added the rest on my own. That fact coupled with the fact we were car shopping made it a slow moving project. We finally found a car yesterday, so the vinyl was finished today and added. (I love the new car, but forgot to take pictures, I was so excited about how good the vinyl turned out!)
I can honestly say this is one of a kind, I searched everywhere and saw nothing like it. I am so proud of how good it turned out!

linking up at Serenity Now, sorry can't get the button to load.

Do you like Peeps?

Ok, so my hubby didn't get this craft at first.  Please tell me it was just him, that it is funny!  I will feel so silly if I am the only one in on the joke! If you guys don't get it I will explain, but I don't want to if I don't have to cause I will feel really dumb lol!  I love peeps and thought these would be perfect for a little Easter/ Spring love to my house... I had this giant piece of beadboard that I got at restore for next to nothing a while back, and had the hubby cut it into 12x12 squares.  The rest I just created on the Silhouette in a baby blue vinyl.  That is what I had and I was too impatient to wait for some to come via mail.  I also cut out their eyes and noses with a scrap piece of black vinyl.  What do you think?  You can't really see it, but the ribbon I have it hanging from is pink polka dot material that I had a scrap of. I was too impatient to wait to buy some blue ribbon, but probably still will so it matches.  Can't wait to get my next project up so I can show it to you, I love, love, love it!

Linked up ">here and tatertots and jello

I am a bloggy slacker!

Ok so I started this blog to keep track of my crafty search for some talent, but then Christmas came.  And my dear hubby bought me a Silhouette.  I have been so in love with my new machine that every spare minute of computer time I have goes to playing with it!  Great for the crafting, not great for the blogging!  So here are a few pics of what I have been up to since Christmas.  This isn't all of what I have done, but just a taste and I promise I will not be such a slacker in the future!

My front door

footballs for a school box top fundraiser

my daughters bday party invites

Craft for the laundry room that I had everything for so free!

The stripling warriors is a story that is in the Book of Mormon, and I have always loved it.  It is about 2000 boys who went to war to save their loved ones.  Even though they were teenagers, they had integrity, respect and faith.  They had learned how to be valiant to our Heavenly Father from their parents.  As a result of their great faith and love for the Savior not a single one perished in the war despite the odds being against them.

And mostly I have been doing a whole lot of this!  In January my daughter turned eight, so she was baptized in February.  I had my 10th anniversary to the best, most amazing man in the world, Valentine's day, Hubby's birthday and of course all the illnesses and migraines to add along the way.  It has been crazy!  I have done a few sewing projects that I will have to show later.  Oh, and I am the "box top" lady for the school with a deadline the 1st of March and a football competition to collect them I have been up to my ears in box tops!  Great for the school, not for the crafting lol!

linking up at tatertots and jello and tip junkie and

My latest and greatest!

Ok, maybe not, but I love this art!  I was lucky enough to win this vinyl kit from here (head over, she has an Etsy shop and is sooo talented!) a couple of months ago and finally found a cupboard door at the Restore that I liked.  It killed me to paint it, it was such a pretty wood color and had black antiqued trim.  I would love to have these all over my kitchen instead of the generic boring blonde wood ones I have now! 

Anyway, I painted it black, then white, sanded the edges, and added a coat of walnut stain and wiped it off right away.  Just enough to age it a little.  I had a hard time getting the vinyl off and did it a little different then Lil Luna did hers just to make it a little more unique.  It wasn't a major difference, and you can't really tell, but I just moved the last 2 letters I think. 

For the tiles that spell out "Forever"  I found this pretty cream and silver damask tissue paper at the Hallmark store.  I had a free coupon, so it worked out perfect!  I love it!  Don't look too close or you will see that some of my vinyl is crooked, I couldn't get it to stick the way I wanted for the life of me!  Crazy that it was even more time consuming then painting, but so worth it!  Now if I could just get my wall painted behind it that would be even better!  Cant quite convince the hubs that it is a priority right now.  He hates painting!