Just had to share a few things I have been up to lately, especially since Valentine’s day is right around the corner! First, are 2 cute books my Mom gave me, Memories Sew Sweet by Sandy Berry and Somerset in Love 2009. I love all of the pink used in both of these books as well as the mixed media. One of Sandy Berry’s quilts from this book is actually featured on pg 136 of Sew Somerset 2007. My quilt is on pg 134! So cool to see her in there with me. I also adore chapter 5 of Somerset in Love, lots of pink and green in Kimberly’s book. The cards I’ve been making lately are from a Martha Stewart Glittered Botanical card kit, so easy and pretty, I changed them up with stamped images on the cards. I also got to go to a Stampin Up card class offered by Kerrie Lightfoot. My daughter and I loved making these together. The blue card was my fav and I changed up the design from her original card to suit my own style. I hope you are inspired to make some sweet stuff of your own!

Our big blue recycling bin was overflowing and we were stuck inside for a rainy day, what better thing to do than open a Martha Stewart Kids magazine and get to crafting! I adored the Papier mache article in the Kids summer 2005 issue, and my kids adored the cars and rocket ship. For the Car I used a big sturdy box and for the rocket we used a Capri sun box, it’s also really sturdy. This craft seems to be a Big process as it takes a few days to dry, so it lost my 4 year olds attention after we taped the box! It’s probably better to pick 1 or 2 things to make as a whole family or 1 for older kids to make by themselves. Cover the area you will be crafting on well with plastic or a paper.

Fo Supplies You will need:

Scissors

Painters tape or packing tape

Boxes and left over cardboard

a Newspaper torn into 1" to 2" wide strips

a Big Bowl with 1 cup Flour to 1.5 cups water stirred

some of the supplies

Newspaper Strips

Big Bowl of Flour Paste

STEP 1: Tape together Boxes and Cardboard to make your Car or Rocket

STEP 2: Place one strip at a time over the shape

80% covered & Starting to see the rocket

Stay tuned for Part TWO

Wanting to have a fun and affordable Hello Kitty Hawaiian party for my daughter’s birthday I scoured the web for some ideas and found some great sites that offer free coloring pages, bookmarks and more. The sites I loved were Family Shopping Bag, coloring pages at Hello Kitty Fun Stuff, along with a Hello kitty mermaid I used for my invites.

We made the bookmarks as favors as well as made cupcakes and bought a pinata ( the pinata would not break!) to round out the kitty theme.

The centerpiece is a Barbie mermaidia set with a little hello kitty we already had. For the Craft we beaded pink, yellow and blue flip-flops with plastic beads and 24 gauge wire that I have had for years! I’m so glad we got to use them and have fun.

I also was also inspired after rescuing this dainty chair from the curb to reclaim it and paint it with a sweet pink dry brush technique. I hope you are also inspired to get out there and PINK!

Recently, after receiving my umpteenth piece of junk mail I decided to upcycle them into Artist trading cards. The cards and postcards were the perfect size for me to cut out several ATCs from. I just added an image to the new card and a little watercolor around the edges and voila! Cute, easy, fun and a lot less landfill!

The vintage style baby loves anything from the 40’s and 50’s especially if it is re purposed, recycled or renewed. My own vintage style baby is surrounded by pink, white and baby blue. And if you are going for the mid century look you just have to reuse chenille bedspreads. I recycled a scrap of bedspread from my grandma with a tshirt into a sweet newborn gown. I also used a 40’s chenille bedspread scrap and vintage beads for the hanging moon. If you have a vintage style baby, crochet is a must along with vintage furniture. We have tons of gorgeous crochet blankets made from the lovely ladies in our lives to decorate the old bassinet that we dry brush painted blue. Vintage baby gowns are fabulous for those summer babys wanting to show off their vintage flair. Sweet and keeps them cool! I hope you find some fun projects to reuse some old things in your life and make them fabulous!

I had fun today and yesterday making pendants out of leftover glass marbles, beads and 24 gauge wire I had from a craft project. They are now re-purposed into wearable art! The process is really just wrapping the main marble with wire creating a loop at the top at the same time and then taking a blue wire and beads and twisting those around the edges of the pendant. Voila! Fast and really pretty.

Love, love, love crayons and coloring but we had tons of pieces and decided to recycle them into new ones. I kind of did my own twist on the melting down and mold process, I used the same color family for each new crayon and poured them into soap molds. It took about 2.5 minutes in the microwave on paper plates and then about an hour for the new seashell crayon to be hard. VERY hot craft so have an adult do the melting and pouring and wear an oven mitt!

I loved the melted wax colors!

Well, June came in with a sweet surprise Baby shower from our small group leaders Adam and Rachel! They had this lovely flower arrangement waiting for us, baby petit fours and gifts! How sweet. We also celebrated my other baby’s, now 4, birthday with an impromptu Speed racer party. It was fun to mix and match all of the birthday supplies from my pantry cabinet and he loved it! We even had a racing stripe bandana from our dress up box that did double duty as a table runner. Inexpensive and really fun. I also did some more “recycling” this week with a vintage pattern from my great grandma and a white dress that was going to the dump, but I reclaimed it and spruced it up with our baby’s initial. Sweet and free project! I hope you have fun this summer in a creative way!

recycled baby dress

Barbie and Ken giftset

the birthday boy and family