Valentine's Day Teacher Bouquet!

I bought a bunch of mini candy canes on after Christmas clearance figuring that I would make the candy cane chocolate hearts, like I did last year, for Lydia's school this year.  (Sorry, I could have SWORN that I did a full tutorial last time, so I didn't bother doing one this year.)  When I decided to make the 3D tootsie pop photo cards instead, I felt kind of bad about all those candy canes going to waste.  So I made a batch anyway and turned them into a bouquet of treats for Lydia's teachers.

I had a round paper tub from raisins that we recently finished, so I set it in the middle of a sheet of tissue paper.  I puled the tissue up to cover the raisin container and used a black ribbon to hold everything in place.  I had a couple small Whitman's Sampler boxes of chocolate, so I put two in the bottom of the container to weigh it down and then set two more on top of the first two so some are initially visible. (I would hate for the heart pops to get eaten and the chocolate boxes to get thrown away!)  Next I started sliding the chocolate candy cane heart pops in around the chocolate boxes.  The picture of the front doesn't look very full, but I think I got 7 or so pops and then 4 boxes of chocolate into the bouquet. (Lydia has 4 teachers and several after school helpers so their should be plenty to go around)

We used one of Lydia's 3D Valentines and just replaced the Tootsie Pop with a Candy Cane Chocolate Heart Pop so everything matches, but her name is on her gift.

Here is the view from the back, showing a better view of all of the goodies.  Hopefully Lydia's teacher's and helpers enjoy the treats!

Valentine's Day Cards

 So, this 3D Valentine has been bouncing around the blog world for a while and I am certain that with the advent of Pinterest, even more moms are opting for this simple semi-homemade Valentine's Day card.  I have no idea who came up with it initially but I did find a good tutorial here.  I half expect to show up with Lydia's cards, only to discover that EVERYONE else saw the same idea (thanks again, Pinterest)!  Oh well!  I was happy to realize that even with one hour developing, I was around $10 for the 60 photos I needed (Lydia's school is combining classes for a super HUGE party).  I could have saved some cash, but I would have needed to plan ahead and that just wasn't happening this month!

Step one: I selected a day when Lydia was not covered in dirt after school and asked her to pose for me.  Thankfully she cooperated with the whole "hold your arm up, now put your hand like this, now look at me, now smile" directions, for about 5 minutes.  I only got 5 quick photos before she lost interest and this is the best one in terms of hand position and smile.  It is not ideal in terms of layout because the hand is too close to the edge of the picture.

Enter Photoshop!  I planned on using PS to add the text, but I also bumped up the saturation of the colors a little and cut the extra grass from the right side of the picture and moved it to the left side of the picture.  I added a pink box and wrote a Valentine's message.  Hopefully this gets me out of asking Lydia to sign her name to 60 cards!

I punched holes just above and just below Lydia's fist.  I then inserted the Tootsie Pop sucker and I was finished! (well, OK..... I repeated those last two steps SIXTY times and THEN I was finished!)  I am SO happy with Lydia's adorable 3D Tootsie Pop Valentine's Day cards.  Here's hoping her little friends enjoy them too.

Valentine Voodoo Doll!

I saw this tutorial on Martha Stewart for making a skeleton out of a pair of white socks.  I must have seen it around Valentine's Day last year.  I thought it was cute, but following the directions and just making a skeleton seemed a little too simple!  If you have seen my Valentine's Day cards, then you know that I like the dark and sarcastic side of the holiday.  I decided to add a few details to turn Martha's Sock Skeleton into a Valentine's Day Voodoo Doll!

You can find the official Martha Stewart template and tutorial here, or you can follow along with my pictures.

First, you get two basic white athletic style socks

Cut the ankle ribbed part off of one sock.

Cut the one ankle ribbed part in half.  These will become the arms.

Lay the other sock so that the heel part is visable.  You are going to cut this socks ribbed ankle part in half lengthways.  These will be the legs and the heal will be the skeleton's rear end, so check to be sure that the legs are going to be in the middle of the rear end before you cut.

Here are the basic pieces lined up in their approximate locations.  Unfortunately this is also where I got either too sick or too busy to document the rest of the progress.  In a nut shell, I sewed each of the arms and each of the legs to create a tube.  I stuffed the doll through the open ends of each arm and leg tube.  To make it a little easier, you probably want to stuff the body BEFORE you sew up the legs.  Last, I sewed the hands and the feet shut.  I sewed a gathering stitch where the neck should be.  At that point I switched to black thread and sewed the button eyes, the skeleton smile, and a few lines for ribs.

At this point it is pretty close to the Martha Stewart version.  I added some nice quilting pins to turn it into a voodoo doll.

To turn it into a Valentine's Day Voodoo Doll, I cut out a small felt heart and slid it under the rib threads.  I just didn't think the skeleton was swanky enough, so I made him a little stove pipe hat to complete the look.

A Circus Celebration

Here's hoping that no one minds one more crafting post about things that I actually am not crafting at the moment.   I PROMISE that I am FINALLY (after 4 weeks of a killer cold and 4 previous weeks of early pregnancy nausea) feeling better and getting going again.  You can imagine after so long that I have a ton of mundane chores to catch up on, but there are already a few projects in the works.  Unfortunately, everything that I am working on right now are gifts for people so I have to wait to share them.  For the time being, dreaming about and planning stuff for the new baby makes me very aware that I was not blogging while dreaming about and planning stuff for Lydia.  I want her to know all the things that were made and arranged for her before she (and this blog) were born.  First on the list was Lydia's Circus Celebration.

 I was blessed with multiple groups of friends who through amazing baby showers.  But when your art teacher friends get together to plan a circus themed party because they know that you are designing a circus themed nursery, the results are bound to be a lot of fun.  These were a few ideas that we bounced around for the invitation.

 I knew about the invitations, but was surprised by just about everything else at the party.  They used popcorn boxes for flower vases.  They chose yellow flowers to replicate the feeling of popcorn.  There were printed pennants that said our names attached to sticks with foil streamers and balloons.

 The cake was made to look like a tent and there are more popcorn boxes filled with food. 

 The art teachers got the graphic design teacher to make a circus poster with our picture on it.

 There were circus stuffed animals used as decorations, that were given to me after the party to add to Lydia's nursery.  I was given a feather boa to wear instead of a corsage.  I am sure that I said thank you to my friends who planned the party, but now I am very excited to blog about their amazing skills and even more amazing friendship!

Ultrasound Update and Party Planning!

So my thirteen week ultra sound was last week. The doctor saw what was needed to rule out the major scary things that doctors look for on an ultrasound.

Unfortunately for me, we didn't see much else. Baby B. (for Burchett) was facing my back, so all we saw was its back. No cute profile picture like I got with Lydia at 13 weeks (see the profile of Lydia with her hand by her face from 2008 to stir up a little in-utero sibling rivalry!)

There was also no suggestion of the gender because, whatever that is, it was also facing my back. I don't mind that last part because if they had seen it this early, I would have known that it was probably a boy and that would have taken some of the fun out of any gender reveal. So, at my next ultrasound, around 20 weeks, the gender should be visible regardless of what gender it is. My idea is to take an envelope along and have the doctor write the gender and seal it up for us. Then I want to have a gender reveal party where we all find out together! Here are the details that are forming in my head.

I saw this invite on Pinterest and I was in love! I already have a thing for bees (Mrs. B. and all) so I love this gender neutral theme. I'm not sure that I would bother with an invite, since it would just be family, but I do like this simple graphic.

Maybe I can make some cards with a similar design for guests to write their gender guesses. Mostly I want to coordinate a few decorations and some fun foods. If the timing is right, we are already having the family over for our annual Easter dinner. We revealed Lydia's gender at Easter, so it's kind of tradition. We already serve "Honey Baked" ham, so a bee themed desert selection could be cute and fitting at a spring event.

I'm thinking of all sorts of fun yellow and black/brown foods, like Twinkies, moon-pies, honeycomb cereal, lemon bars, yellow and black jelly beans, marshmallows with yellow sprinkles. That is probably WAY more food than I need, but fun to think of the possibilities, especially because so many don't require ME to make them!

I am kind of dying to try making these jelly bean almond bees that I found on Pinterest (more details here).  I haven't looked up the step by step directions yet, but it looks like a black jelly bean with some dark chocolate piped on for a head and a stinger.  Then some yellow chocolate stripes and two slivered almond wings.  I think these would look GREAT on lemon bars and maybe on a few cookies.  I think I would want to scatter them EVERYWHERE! 

For decorations, I am sort of obsessed with this beehive piñata. It shouldn't be too hard to make, since it IS the shape of a balloon!  I am toying with this pinata being the way we all find out the news. Here is my plan: I could make the piñata ahead of time and just not fill it myself. I could then have two different bags of confetti, one in pink and one in blue. Here is the tricky part. I need a semi-crafty and extremely discrete helper to open the envelope from the doctor and fill the piñata with the appropriate gender filling. The helper would need to not be close family who would be at the reveal. However, they would need to live near my house because I don't want to risk any extra time between the piñata being filled and the party happening. I think I would just want to deliver it the night before the party and pick it up the day of, preferably only a short time before the party. I don't trust the information being out there for long and I do NOT trust myself alone with only a paper mâché beehive standing between me and shopping for baby clothing. So that's my idea.  You can try to tell me that I am crazy, but I will just refer you to the sign below!

Crafty Clothing!

Do you think a person can make a living as a personal thrift store shopper?  As in, you tell me what you need, kids cloths in certain sizes or a specific style of dress, and I hunt it for you?  Maybe not, but I certainly do enjoy offering my services to my friends as a courtesy.  I am always excited when I find just the right thing for myself, but I am probably double excited to find something that a friend needs.  Especially when it is a special request for a special occasion.  This week I found two items that friends had asked for help. 

A while back a friend sent me this picture.  It is a turn of the century gown that was part of a Titanic exhibit.  Her daughter was in love with the dress and wanted something similar for prom.  She wanted to know if I could make it.  Now I sew, but I am not a really detail oriented fitted and tailored type of sewer.  If I need that sort of thing I am much happier to buy something that is close and Frankenstein it together.  I immediately responded that we needed to find two dresses, preferably at a thrift store; one blue strapless dress and one wedding dress with nice lace.  

I have been looking and looking and THIS was the first blue prom dress that I found. I got really excited and sent a picture and the location of the dress to the mom.  I couldn't find a size or a price and it was at Goodwill, which tends to be a little pricey for a thrift store.  Formal dresses, especially, are often priced at $50 and up.  That isn't a lot compared to a new prom dress, but when it is an ingredient in a bigger project, it can add up.  So here is the BEST news.  The mom was told that is was a $10 dress.  Not BAD!  Even BETTER, she noticed a rip at the hem and when she asked about it they cut the price in half!  So $5 for the perfect color and shape for the foundation of the dress.  We still have to find that wedding dress lace, but the prom project is off to a good start!

Project number two is a wedding dress.  I don't EVEN want to think about sewing a wedding dress!  This is the inspiration image....except that she wants it to be RED!  I want to help, but no matter how much the bride to be tries to convince me that it is "just like sewing curtains", I do NOT want to sew all that lace.  It is WAY above my skill level.  So I am desperate to find SOMETHING for this project, but not very optimistic.

And then I saw this.  It's red, and lace, and French, and silk, and also did not have a price listed. It had a size, but being a French garment it was a European size, so after Cheryl math and Google conversion charts we think it might work and are going to check it out this weekend.  Wish us luck that it is still there, that it does fit, and that the price isn't outrageous! 

New Fabrics for the Circus Nursery

Sorry to be posting so little the last few weeks.  I am STILL fighting this never ending (3 1/2 week+) cold!  Mostly I am sleeping as much as possible to try and get healthy.  I have an ultrasound in about an hour, so should have some pictures to post soon.  While I still don't know what gender we are dealing with, and I don't feel well enough to actually make much, and I am still submitting TONS of paperwork for the major exciting deal that I am not allowed to talk about (still nothing official to report but we are still in the running and it is getting SO SO close to a decision) I have been searching the Internet and pinning pins to my Pinterest Baby Board. 

Yesterday I stumbled on some amazing fabric that is too perfect of a match to Lydia's nursery fabrics not to make SOMETHING out of it.  Here is a view of Lydia's circus train car crib, which was my circus train car crib back in the 1970's.  My dad made it and I am so happy that he put so much care into it.  I also have to thank my sister for storing it through about 20 years when no one needed or wanted it.  I repainted it a more modern (less 1970's orangish) red and added stenciling and some decorative hardware.

I wasn't sure that I was making all the bedding, but I walked into a fabric store that was going out of business and found all these blue and red and green and gold fabrics.  I had my color pallet, but I didn't have any specific projects in mind.  I just bought random amounts, basically all that I could afford or all that they had.  it was a going out of business sale, so I got a TON of fabric and I made a crib sheet, a LONG bed skirt, I covered a car seat, and still had enough to get my mom to make a quilt and a bumper.  I had NO scraps left of that original fabric.

 Then I found these brand new Michael Miller fabrics and I am in LOVE!!!! I don't know what I need to coordinate with the room, but I WILL make something with these patterns.

 I am itching to cover another car seat, we had 2 for Lydia and I used one so much that it is worn out and the other is still the boring factory design.... from several years ago!  I am restraining myself because it is definitely NOT on sale, but I will definitely be buying SOME of this circus-y gorgeousness.  I'll let you know what I do with it soon!