Birthday Signs!

Are you guys tired of Watermelons yet?  I hope not cause I have lots more to come!  Tonight I worked on the signs for my front step sign hanger things!  And guess what?  I didn't use vinyl this time, but I did use my Cricut!

I made stencils using the Calligraphy cartridge and CDS and painted all the letters!  I used the sander to make everything look a little old, added a couple of Watermelons, some ribbon and my favorite cheap upholstery tacks from WalMart.  I can't wait to hang them up....34 days and counting!

Don't forget to enter my $50 CSN giveaway here!

Another CSN Giveaway!

***This Giveaway is Closed***
 
Do you ♥ shopping?  I do!

Do you ♥ shopping even more when you have a gift certificate to spend?  I do!

Well you are in luck because CSN Stores is offerering one of my amazingly fabulous readers a $50 gift certificate to be used at any of their 200+ stores!

I am in dire need of new dishes, the dishes that we recieved as wedding gifts are slowly but surely disappearing and breaking.  Boo!  So off to Cookware.com I went in search of the perfect set of dishes!  And I wasn't disappointed!  Because I found Corelle!!  Why do I want Corelle?  Because last month my almost 2 year old dropped a Corelle bowl off the table onto a concrete patio and it didn't break...it wins my vote!

Look at some of the amazing patterns I found

I love the colors of this set!

I would honestly think about redoing my dining room to match this gorgeous set!

I am in love with these square plates!

And I am positive that my noodles would taste so much better if they were drained in this colander!

CSN offers so many products you could spend days deciding what to buy from any of their 200+ stores!

Want to enter?  Come on....you know you do!

There are only a few simple rules....

* Become a follower (only followers are eligible to win)*

*Please make sure to leave your email address if it's not available on your profile so I can contact you if you win*

*This giveaway is only open to US and Canadian residents*

*Leave a comment for each thing you do*

 

1. Go check out their amazing selection of Corelle or Cookware and come back and tell me what your favorite is - 1 entry
2. Follow me or become a follower - 1 entry

3. Blog, Tweet or Facebook about this giveaway - up to 3 entries

This giveaway will close on August 7, 2010 at 11:59pm MDT.  Good luck!!!

Quatrefoil Cut File!

I decided to take a break from the birthday projects for a night because I am obsessed with quatrefoil.  Is anyone else obsessed with Quatrefoil?  I have seen so many amazing quatrefoil projects floating around blog land and decided that I had to make something!  Here is my inspiration...

The ever amazing Jen of Tatertots and Jello showed off her amazing projects and provided a free stencil download at the CSI Project here.

 

And Amanda at Imperfectly Beautiful showed us her gorgeous wall art here.

I just recently found Shelley at the House of Smith's.  Look at her amazing pantry makeover, isn't it do die for?

I decided that I could use my Cricut and Design Studio to make my own stencil/template.  Here is what I spent the last 3 hours doing.

I probably could have cut Jen's stencil out about 50 times!  But look what the finished result is.

I have big plans for this!  I used the Plantin SchoolBook Cartridge.  In the demo mode of Cricut Design Studio you can cut with the cartridge your Cricut came with, so if you don't have or want to buy CDS but your Cricut came with the Plantin SchoolBook cartridge you can cut this file!

If you are interested leave me your email address and I will email you the .cut file!

Watermelon Anyone?

I am in birthday mode!  Only 5 weeks til Tay turns 2 {insert tear here}.  I finished her invitations tonight!  And of course since it's 10 o'clock I can not get a decent picture, I will try again tomorrow when the sun is out.  But for now here they are!

Tay ♥'s Watermelon!

Have I mentioned that I now ♥ my sewing machine?  Paper is so much easier to sew than fabric, there are no folds or seams that I have to worry about!  I have seen so many cards on etsy that are embroidered that I figured I would give it a try.  It was so easy!

I figured out a little trick!  It only took me 3 cards to figure out because I was too lazy to get up and google sewing paper!  There is an annoying string that shows on the front of the card and I knew I couldn't cut it off because my card would fall apart because I was too lazy to glue the pink paper to the green paper before sewing it!

Notice the annoying string?

 Carefully pull your bottom(bobbin) string from the back of the card.  It will create a loop like the picture on the right.  Gently pull the loop until the annoying string is pulled all the way through and both of your strings are on the back.

So much prettier without said annoying string!

I used my cricut to cut the watermelons using the Doodlecharms cartridge.  I found the paper at Hobby Lobby, it is My Mind's Eye Penny Lane Collection.  I cut the seeds out of glitter card stock.

I think they are finished...part of me wants to add something else to them.  "Hi my name is Kenzie and I can't leave well enough alone."  I need an intervention!  Hope everyone has a great night!

Featured at Craft-O-Maniac

My Blogging Pet Peeve

One of my favorite parts about blogging is seeing everyone's crafty projects and reading about their every day lives.  I have been known to craft-lift projects on occasion.  But when I do borrow someone's idea, I make sure I add their name, the link back to their project and email or comment and let them know I am linking to their project in my post.

I don't mind if you borrow my ideas but I would really appreciate it if you would let me know.  One of my biggest blogging pet peeves is seeing my project on someones blog with no recognition.  Or I found this project here, and the "here" is the link back to my post.  Come on!!!  If you can take the time to make what I made and blog about it, you can take 1 minute and let me know you are linking back to my post!  For crying out loud you had to come to my blog to get the url of my post!

Thanks for letting me vent!  Please use my ideas if you like them but give credit where it is due if you blog about them, it's only nice!

Tissue Paper Pom-Poms

Taylor is turning 2 at the beginning of September and I am already starting to make decorations!  I can't believe my baby is going to be 2 in 6 weeks :(  Today I asked her if she would stay little forever and she said that she would, I told her she couldn't grow or learn any more words and she agreed, she seemed cool with it!

The theme for her party is going to be watermelons, I think, at the very least it will be a pink and green birthday!  I was googling tissue paper the other day and found a tissue paper pom-pom tutorial on Martha Stewart's site here.  I am not a huge Martha fan but I can't argue with cute and cheap!

Just in case you don't want to go check out her site I have included my picture tutorial.

I used the Hallmark tissue paper from WalMart for the pink and green pom pom-poms.  There were 9 sheets per package for $1.  I made 4 pom-poms from each package.  I bought the white tissue paper at the Dollar Tree and cussed it every step of the way, it wasn't as strong as the WalMart tissue.

Make approximately 1.5" wide accordion folds.

Tie a piece of craft wire around the middle of your paper, you could also use twist ties or a piece of pipe cleaner.  Round the ends of your tissue paper.

Start by pulling up the top layer of tissue paper and fluff.

Continue to pull up the tissue papers and fluff.  After you have pulled up approximately 4 sheets of tissue turn it over and work from the other side.

After you have finished pulling all of the papers start to fill in the holes by fluffing to your liking!

Here is one of my finished pom-poms.  Aren't they going to look so cute hanging from the dining room chandelier!  6 weeks and counting!  At least I have a good head start!

Sleeping Wars

It's 11 pm and I just got Kielyn to sleep.  This the 4th night in a row that she hasn't gone to bed before 11.  They normally go to bed at 8:30, tonight they got to stay up until 9:15 because it's Saturday night after all!

Ben left last Saturday and the sleeping war started Monday night.  First she had to potty again and then she needed a drink, and then she couldn't find her ballet shoes and then she needed her princess book and then...  At least Monday and Tuesday night she was asleep by 9:15.

I am assuming that since her Daddy is gone she is having issues, but I don't think I can handle one more night of this without losing it.  Tonight she was so tired, you know the kind of tired where all they can do is cry hysterically, that she cried for 45 minutes.  At first every time she got up I told her to go back to bed, and after a while I was putting her in bed, after the crying started I was frantically racking my brain thinking "what would Super Nanny do?"  I finally sat next to her bed without looking at her and without talking to her for about 30 minutes.  Eventually she quit crying and was laying their quietly.  I got up and sat in the living room for another 20 minutes before she was asleep.

Next week we are back on a more normal routine.  Our daycare lady was on vacation last week so my cousin watched them.  I am hoping that by going back to daycare we resume our "normal" days minus daddy.  I am tired and grouchy so I am headed to bed!

Have a great Sunday!

Halloween Alert

Lately I have had overwhelming urges to start creating Halloween Decor.  Don't ask me why, I have never been a huge Halloween decorator.  Today I ran into the Dollar Tree to buy some tissue paper and did the usual store scope.  You know the one where you stalk each aisle daring someone to get in your way looking for something you can transform, oh you don't do that?  Um, yeah, me either.

As I was heading to the wrapping paper section the Halloween decor seriously Halloween decor in July caught my eye and I couldn't help but look.  And I spied some of the cutest headstones ever...Eeek!

How cute will those skeleton hands and skulls look in my apothecary jars?

Love them!

I had to scoop these up today, if they didn't have them in October I would be devastated!

I was so excited about my new decor that I totally forgot about my tissue paper and had to go back later!

Have you been fitted?

Bras, hate them or love them they are a necessity.  Personally I hated them, I think they were invented by men to torture us.  Did you notice I said hated?  Don't get me wrong I still don't love them but I am much happier after my sister forced me to go to Nordstroms and get properly fitted.

Google Images

Guess what, I was not wearing the correct bra size, according to the nice lady who helped me 90% of women are wearing the wrong bra size.  Holy cow!  I was not blessed in the chest department, my share of boobs was split between my sisters hate you!  I walked into Nordstroms wearing a 36A an guess what I walked out wearing?  A 32C.  The cup size I was wearing was correct, but the band was wrong.

And no I am not really a C cup but according to the bra lady I am.  If you drive by the middle school 85% of the girls there are bigger than I am and they are only 13. 

Are you asking yourself yet why you are still reading?  I really do have a point!  My clothes fit so much nicer, there are no gaps at the top of my bra!  I can actually wear a lower cut shirt and create the illusion of cleavage all thanks to my new bras!

So, find your closest department store and ask to be fitted for a bra, it's free and you might be surprised!  Thanks to my sister for forcing me to do it!

Amazing and Pathetic

Ok, first the amazing part!

Look what I got!  A new sewing/embroidery machine!  I am really excited!  I have spent the last 2 nights playing with it and I haven't even began to check out the embroidery function yet, can't wait!

Now for the pathetic part :(

The only thing I have to show for my 2 nights worth of playing is in bed with my daughter.  I tried to make an apron (with no pattern, did I mention I don't sew?) she thought it was a blanket for her doll and I had no idea how to finish it so I gave it to her.  Want to see?  Um probably not but just in case, ha!

Love the little cherries, they are so cute!

I made pleats or gathers?!?

Playing with decorative stitching and I am getting better at sewing a straight line!

UPDATE...The bug just got out of bed to tell me her baby blanket looked like a bib, she's right, can you say epic fail?

One more, just cause she's so pretty!

So does anyone have any tips or tricks they want to share?  Or come give me a lesson (mom are you coming soon?)?

Happy 9 o'clock Dance of Joy!