Bow Holder

Baby Bear's hair bow collection is getting a little bit intense and taking over her sock drawer. I was looking on Etsy for bow holders and all I could really find were the same lame, generic ribbon with a princess crown or something lame on them. That's not Baby Bear at all, so for about $4, I made her one that suits her and matches her room.

Materials:
- small wooden letter (got it at Joann's for about $1)
- white spray paint
- fat ribbon ($3 at Joann's)
- Tacky glue

Spray paint letter and let dry. Once dry, cut ribbon to desired length and attach it to the back of the letter with tacky glue. I added a bow at the bottom with a separate piece of ribbon and used tacky glue to glue it on. Easy DIY bow holder. Now if Baby Bear would just grow some hair..

Rustic Coasters

As anyone who has gotten married knows, after the wedding is over, you're left with a dozen or so centerpieces. I have 30 slices of a tree trunk, vases, drop in candle holders, and about a billion pine cones. There's a website you can sell them on now, but if you're lazy like me, that doesn't sound very appealing. Instead, I decided to repurpose some of my decorations into useful things instead of filling up my parents' basement with boxes of things to store. My first project: natural coasters out of the wood slices. My hubs' grandpa cut up a log for us into slices before the wedding, about an inch and a half thick. Then we polyurethaned the top and bottom to keep them from cracking, but left the bark natural. We probably could have stopped at this step and used them as is, but the slices slid on our end tables and knowing my luck, would result in a dark colored beverage spilled all over my light colored carpet.  Luckily, I had some extra grippie kitchen cabinet and drawer liner so we cut circles in the liner and used tacky glue to affix it to the bottom of the wood slices. I let them dry over night and wa-la! Pretty much free, recycled coasters!

Top

Bottom

Perfect coffee holder!

Salt Dough Ornaments

The hubs and I found a hand print ornament kit at Bed, Bath and Beyond just after turkey day and I was SO excited to try it out. Since it's baby bear's first Christmas, we wanted to do something extra special to remember it, thus baby hand prints (generic, we know). It was basically foam that you molded and pressed the baby's hand into, with some extra parts to make it an idiot proof project. Well I guess I'm an idiot then, because that foam didn't roll out, it just stuck to the rolling pin, the table, the waxed paper, the baby's hand.. And if anyone has ever tried to do something like this with a 4 month old, they know that getting them to spread out their hand is pretty much impossible. Long story short, after about the 5th attempt to get the ornament re-rolled out because the baby kept grabbing instead of spreading those little fingers, steam was coming out of my ears and the hubs kindly picked up the whole kit and deposited it in the trash can. Whew. That was the biggest waste of $10 to date. Luckily, I happened to peruse Pinterest that day and find a salt dough ornament recipe. I figured that since I already had all of the ingredients, it was worth a try. Huge success.

Here's the recipe:

Salt Dough

2 cups of flour

1 cup of table salt

1 cup of lukewarm water

Mix the flour and salt together in a bowl, then add about half of the water, stirring with a knife. Add the water one spoonful at a time, until the dough comes together and is pliable enough to knead, but not sticky.

Knead the dough for 10 minutes to remove all of the air bubbles. Roll out to about 1/4 thick, using a dusting of flour if necessary. Use a cookie cutter to cut out a shape, press baby's hand into dough and make a hole for string at the top. Place in the oven at 120 degrees for 2 hours. 

My variation: I used a bowl to cut the circles (we're classy in these parts), since my cookie cutters weren't large enough. Also, to poke the hole at the top, I used an icing tip. I used a toothpick to write baby bear's name on the ornaments. Since my oven doesn't go as low as 120 degrees, I just placed my ornaments on a piece of waxed paper and let them dry out for three or four days. When dry, I applied a coat of polyurethane to seal them. Add some ribbon and wah-la! Perfect gift for Grandparents! 

I HIGHLY suggest that you place the cut out piece on the cookie sheet BEFORE you do the hand print, so it doesn't get stuck to the counter and you don't end up getting into a yelling match with your kitchen counter like I did... Not the best circles, but it was a learning experience.

Finished product:

Success. And the grandmas loved them!

Quiet Book

My newest project idea, thank you to Pinterest, is to make a quiet book for baby bear for her first birthday. I found some really neat ideas on blogs that I'm pretty sure were made by professional crafters, and well, let's be honest, I'm far from being one, so I'm just hoping to do something simple. Here's what I'm thinking.

Cover - Dark purple or pink fabric with a print fabric "A" on it, ribbon tie closure
Pages:
- Winter: snow globe made from clear vinyl with beads inside
- Spring: grass pocket at the bottom of the page with flowers inside that pull out and snap into place to "grow", maybe a movable bee or butterfly too
- Summer: beach scene with ocean made from ribbon and a few fishies on the ribbon that move back and forth, a removable sand castle, pail, shovel and shell
- Fall: stick tree with fall colored leaves that detach, then bushel basket pockets in the grass with the numbers 1-5 on them, and leaves numbered 1-5 (1 leaf for number 1, 2 leaves for number 2, etc.)
- A ballet slipper with ribbon attached and loops of elastic to lace through, then tie in a bow at the top
- Removable shapes that store in a zippered pocket that get placed on their match (with shape name written on them)
- A felt Zeus face with a collar attached to unbuckle, removable "toys" and food for his bowl
- Clock - also have "A que hora?" written on this page
- Dress-up doll with outfits that velcro from their hanger spot to the dolly
- Cupcakes with interchangable frosting tops and baby's name spelled out with removable letters
Back cover will be an owl with a pocket for it's belly to store crayons, etc.

I'm not allowed to start this project until after I take the GRE on Feb. 4, but I'm already planning it out and thinking about acquiring supplies :)

Homemade Dog Treats!

Caught. I'm totally one of those people who gives gifts to their animal..and their animal's friends and cousins.. Last year, we hunted all over God's green earth for the perfect toy for Zeus' girlfriend, June, a black lab, until we finally found her one that had 12 squeakers in it.. Yes, TWELVE squeakers. June's humans probably weren't very happy with us for that one. While trying to think of something to get Lexi, my sister in law's black lab who we owe a thousand thank you's to for wearing out our 18 lb. monster on a regular basis, I decided that food was the way to go. She loves food. LOVES it. I've always wanted to make homemade dog treats, but haven't yet because my creature is the one dog in the entire world that doesn't like peanut butter, and almost all of the recipes I've found are peanut butter. What kind of dog doesn't like peanut butter? We're still not sure that our black and white energy ball is in fact a dog.. Anyways, here's the recipe I used from this website that has TONS of recipes in different flavors.

Peanut Butter Dog Treats

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1 1/2 cups white flour
1/2 cup peanut butter (all-natural or organic)
1 cup water
2 tablespoons oil 

Directions:Preheat the oven to 350 F. Combine oil, peanut butter and water. Add flour, one cup at a time, forming a dough. Knead dough into firm ball and roll to 1/4 inch thickness.

Cut into 3 to 4 inch pieces. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 350 F for 20 minutes. Makes 2 1/2 dozen cookies.

To make them festive, I used Christmas cookie cutters. I wrapped the treats up into a little cookie gift bag and put them under the tree. Hopefully Lexi will like them! 

Recycled Map Wall Art

It's no secret that my favorite place in the world is Michigan. When I started thinking about how to decorate our sterile white walled guest room to make it a little more welcoming, I decided that I wanted to use as much recycled and repurposed materials as possible. The walls/ceiling in the room as typical for an upstairs - angled and sloped. I decided that a Michigan themed room would be fun since most of our visitors are residents of Pure Michigan. There was an old state map in my car that I cut out and mod podged onto some foam board, then cut the Great Lakes out from the foam board around it. We also had some old license plates that I hung on the wall. There's still a ton more work to be done up there, including an "East Lansing" themed wall, but here's what I've made so far:

When the room is completely done, it's going to be an awesome guest space. I guess that means you should probably come visit and see it!

DIY Memo Board

When I picked out the "forest" theme for baby bear's room, I figured that I'd be able to find tons of coordinating accessories since "eco" is in right now. Wrong. I really wanted a memo board to put above her changing table to display pictures of family since we live so far away from all of them. After lots of searching, I decided to just make my own, and did it from 50% recycled materials :)

I cut a piece of a cardboard box to the size of rectangle I wanted, then, using a staple gun and some glue, covered the front of it with bubble wrap. We found pine tree fabric at Hobby Lobby that worked perfectly, so I used about 3/4 of a yard of it to cover the board. Brown ribbon stretched diagonally across the board made the picture holders, secured onto the back by the staple gun. We also found neat wooden animals at Hobby Lobby that I super glued thumb tacks to the back of and stuck into the board over the criss-crosses in the ribbon. Easy, cheap, and recycled :)

A Toy Box for Baby Bear

One of the sucky parts of being a military family is that you learn to say goodbye to people frequently. People are always coming and going, and it seems like as soon as you make a great friend, they're moving on to something else or it's your time to go. Sometimes that cycle can have its advantages though, like when someone is moving to Germany and has some old furniture they're getting rid of. We scored a pair of short 3-drawer dressers, one skinny and one fat, that I'm going to refinish and turn into a toy box and an end table. They're pretty rough right now, but when I'm all done, the toy box will be a deep green with chalkboards on the sides and the end table will be a dark brown. Woohoo for free furniture and repurposing!!!!

Dresser we used:

Minus two drawers, plus a new piece of wood for a shelf:

My materials: Chalkboard paint, regular paint and a piece of wood

Spartan Green Paint!

Taped off a rectangle on each side with painter's tape to make the chalkboards within:

Finished product:

Front view - note the leaf drawer pulls!

Little Baldy's Accessories

The baby bear was somehow born with really fine, blonde hair. I'm yet to figure out how that happened, but it did, and apparently having a bald baby means that she looks like a boy. Even when she's wearing pink from head to toe. Just this morning, a guy at the store commented on how baby bear is starting of right with HIS Detroit Tiger's blanket. She was wearing a pink jacket too, mind you. Anyways, I feel bad that everyone always thinks poor baby bear is a boy, so I made her some hair bows. I think they're super cute, and they're really easy to make. If you have a little girl and you want some of these, I may just be able to hook you up, in any pattern/color scheme you want :)

These particular bows were made for hubby's friends' daughter who is still a little blonde baldy at a year old.

They look cute on a headband (for the little baldy), or just clipped into hair.My nieces rocked these bows in red with white polka dots for our wedding and looked super cute doing so :)

A Very EcoFriendly Wedding

It's no secret that I'm VERY ecologically minded. I mean, I did major in Parks and Recreation in college. And no, I don't want to be a park ranger. Anyways, when I started planning for my November wedding last spring, it was very important to me that we used as much natural material in the decor as possible, and also that we didn't make/buy a bunch of stuff that would just get thrown away. Who am I to generate a ton of extra trash with wedding crap? Fortunately, a "rustic" theme worked perfect for us, since my hubs and I are outdoorsy people. He even proposed in the nature preserve behind our home, with our dog in tow. I also didn't want to spend a small fortune on decorations, so I decided to make as much as possible. I surprised myself with my creativity. Here's some of what we did:

Stick candle - made with a $1 glass vase, sticks from the woods behind my home and green raffia. All hot-glued together and somehow still intact after a long travel from their fabrication site in Maryland to Michigan for the wedding

Centerpieces - I used a $1 vase and a drop-in candle holder that the hubs found on Ebay, sheer green ribbon, filled with a pine cone (my mom found these), acorns (my 2 year old niece picked up for us) and fake cranberries from Hobby Lobby, all atop a slice of tree trunk that Grandpa sliced up for us. Nothing fancy, but it worked for us!

Head table with stick candles

I'm really proud of these, if you can't tell.

The place cards - We snagged some sticks from my in-laws back yard, threw them in a vase from the dollar store with some pebbles and wah-la! The place cards were leave shaped, so it worked.

Turned out way cooler than anticipated!

 The decor obviously was not the main attraction at the wedding, but we ended up as Mr. and Mrs. by the end of the day, so I'd call it a success.

Who Needs Snow?

Having grown up in the Great White North, I'm used to having snow by now. Waking up to a white blanket of frozen goodness coating the yard was just expected on Christmas morning, but now, living south of the Mason-Dixie, it's an impossible dream. I'm one of those crazy people who LOVES snow and everything about it. Especially around Christmas time. And I LOVE Christmas. And decorating for Christmas. And baking for Christmas. And Christmas music. And Christmas lights. Pretty much, I love everything about Christmas, from the shopping to the family parties and midnight church on Christmas Eve. I can only hope that my daughter will love Christmas as much as I do, and that her daddy continues to support my Christmas craziness.

Moving to a new state just before the holidays means having to find new craft stores and a new farm to get our tree from. Alas, it was taken me just over a week to succeed at both of these things. Where there's a will, there's a way. After a trip to two different stores complete with three separate screaming fits by my 3 month old daughter, I came home with a starter wreath for my front door and some goodies to decorate it with. The baby bear and I made a wreath that I think looks pretty darn good, considering it's my first project of this sort ever.

Also, since last year, my husband sat in his car for two hours and secretly stitched my name onto my stocking, I thought I would do something extra special for his this year. Hubs is in love with bacon, so I made his name in bacon letters.

It doesn't get much more awesome than that.