Stripes of July!

A little rewind from a few weeks ago.   The SweetSassyDiva DT was asked to make some 4th of July projects.   However, this particular project was to use STRIPES.  When I decided to do this, I thought....sure, that's easy!  Three colors, some stripes, some stars, tada!  Oh, but the catch..... TRY NOT TO USE STARS!   My brain froze.  How do you do 4th of July without stars???

After some thinking and staring at the wall I knew exactly what I wanted to do!



I decided to make a new door hanger for the holiday

I used Recollection, DCWV and Core'dinations papers
Gypsy Wanderings for the postage stamp cut {11.25"}
I hand cut the white mat {9.75" x 9.75"} and layered that with the blue mat {9.75" x 5"}
I did ink the edges of those mats with Tim Holtz distress ink before adhering together.
I cut a border from the kraft paper with a Fiskars punch and placed it below the blue mat.
Wrapped red bakers twine around the bottom of the white mat to add some color and texture.
I added some faux stitching all the way around with a white marker.



The red and white stripes were cut {1" x 5"} and {1" x 9.75"}
I doubled up on the reds and placed 3D foam between to give those stripes more dimension

For my medallion,  I made an accordion fold rosette from some patterned paper.  I used two {1" x 12"} strips glued together. 
For the number I used Sweet Treats with REAL DIAL SIZE {2"} and did some faux stitching in white.
The letters were welded together on the Gypsy using BATMAN font {1.25"}, faux stitched and layered onto the number.



The rocket cuts are from Designers Calendar {2.25"} in varying colors.  I popped up the center rocket for dimension and added some white dots with a Gelly Roll pen.
I tucked those in behing the rosette and adhered down.



As you can see...I stayed away from the stars by using white buttons.
I added some polka dot grosgrain ribbon from SU! to the back and proudly hung on my front door.

Hope you are all having a wonderful week.  Be sure to visit SweetSassyDiva each day and see the amazing work from the Design Team.  

Finally a winner!

First I would like to apologize to myself and to you.   It's been so crazy around here.  There is no time to get anything done.   Well.....we are spending some great time together and making some pretty awesome memories.   But it in the blogging department...not so good.

Emily's birthday turned into a week of activities.   Cake for three days, swimming, dinner out, picnics, the zoo, all sorts of fun things.   We are still working on her birthday party for next weekend also.




I did actually use my Cricut too!   I cut out a 5 {6"} from chipboard and used it as a stencil to pour in the pink sprinkles on top of the cake.

I also cut chipboard and paper with MS Cake Cart for the base {fit to page = 10.5"}


And for the winner of the Cricut Magazine Birthday Issue

Tamara said...

Congrats and thanks for sharing an issue with one of us!!! I would love to win!!! :)

Congratulations!!!  Please send me and email (subject: Hoo's Crafty Winner!) with all your information and I will get this copy out to you right away.  Thank you to everyone who entered the drawing.  Hope your summer is going as well as ours is.

Another Birthday!

Summers mean Birthday's! At least they do here in our house.   All of my kids have a summer birthday.   As a late Fall birthday-er, I have always wanted a summer party.  Well, until I realize that now you can't have a school party or hand out invitations to all of your friends.  Boo!


{2006 - a week old}

Thankfully...we have lots of friends outside of school and we had an awesome teacher last year who wrote down addresses for us.  YAY!


{1st birthday}

My mini-me Emily is 5 today!  HOLY COW!!   It does not seem possible.   In the last week she has lost her first tooth and learned to tie her shoes!  

{2nd birthday}

 Her party is in a couple of weeks, but today we celebrate family style.  A day full of anything Emily wants to do.   So far her list is crafting with Mommy, making a pink cake with pink icing, going to the zoo, getting presents, and going to a "fancy" restaurant {anyplace with a waiter and a candle on the table}.

{3rd birthday}

We will see what she really decides on doing, I will stand by ready for anything.


{4th birthday}

Where does the time go?????


Happy Birthday my sweet little Emily!

Happy 4th!!

I hope everyone was able to enjoy their weekend!





Download this FREE printable courtesy of



Happy Independence Day!

Cricut Magazine *Giveaway*

Northridge  Publishing offers many amazing magazine publications.   Lucky for us Cricut users, they have released a magazine full of amazing projects made exclusively with the Cricut.  





This magazine began as a bimonthly publication and is now monthly!!!

You can find these magazines at your local craft store, online, or even get your own subscription.
Cricut Magazine also has released special editions "The Birthday Idea Book"  , "Cricut Cards Idea Book", just to name a few.   These are not part of the monthly subscription, but are certainly a must have!

The Idea book celebrates everything birthday.   From invites to party favors, gifts to decor; there are step by step instructions from some amazing designers and crafters.   I was lucky enough to be featured in this issue above.  I designed and made an invitation for Madeline's 2nd Birthday (2010) and it was chosen to be published.   SO EXCITING!!!  I am so flattered to be in this issue with so many great designers that I envy their work.   It's an honor.


screen snapshot, you can see this bigger on the sneak peek


Since I have not been getting my usually "craft time" lately, and not posting as often as I wish I need to say THANK YOU to all of you who keep coming back to check on me,  read about my happenings with the kids, and check out my not so crafty days.    I was given an extra copy of this magazine and I would like to send it off to YOU!  

To enter:
1.  Be a Follower
2.  Comment on this post

Extra Entries for each
Post to Twitter, Facebook or your blog


If you have not seen this issue yet, there is a Sneak Peek Here.

Q&A from past posts:

Tutorial for my Father's Day pic:    I would definitely love to show you how I made and edited the photo I took of the kids for Father's Day.   I am just learning and it was really easy.  Picnik is a free online editing software that you will LOVE if you haven't already tried it.   I will be working on that soon and get it posted.


DIY Outdoor Chalk Paints:    We painted with these all day long, on and off.   As it sat it started to harden.  Adding just a little bit more water fixed the problem.   It rained a little at the end of the day and it began to wash away.  No stains at all.   I haven't washed it all off yet, but when I do I will take a pic of the driveway.  I see no signs of stains being left behind at all. 

DIY - Summer Fun

Yesterday was our first craft day.  It looked a bit cloudy so we decided to stay away from the pool.  Silly me...it was beautiful and hot out!  Oh well, I still want to do these activities with the kids.



Can ya guess what we decided to do??

Sidewalk Chalk Paints

Super simple to make and we had a great time painting the driveway and sidewalks.  It was a wonderful blank canvas to be creative.   The stories they told while painting were wonderful. 

All you need is some cornstarch, water, and food colors

I used small 9 oz. clear plastic cups.  Filled them half way with cornstarch.   Added water till the cornstarch was covered {about half the cup} and mixed until it was smooth and milky.   Be sure to get all clumps out.   Add food coloring of any color. 



There are a bunch of other how to's you can look up.  You can even make some new hard chalks using toilet paper tubes.  That's on our list to try over the summer.   Madeline accidentally spilled an entire cup of the blue in the dining room before we went out and it cleaned right up.   It does have that chalky look once dry, but with just water it was like it never happened.




The colors do get more vibrant as they dry.   At first it is fairly watery and it is hard to see.   I think the white comes out the best {no food color added}

It was a
FUN  DAY

Girls Night Out

It doesn't happen often, but I love the chance to get out of the house with some girl friends and have a good time.   No yelling, wiping noses, picking up toys.  It's a good time!

A friend asked me the other day when we could schedule our next girl's night out, and it got me in the mood to make something!

This is an A2 card

Papers from Recollections, Core'dinations & Me and My Big Ideas
Hand cut mats, machine stitched, and bakers twine from The Twinery
Cricut cut from Pack Your Bags {3.5"}
Sentiment from i-clings by Studio G
Fiskars circle punch



The gems, stitching, twine and 3D foam does give it dimension and texture.

I added some white dots to the glass with my Gelly Roll pen, and inked the edges with chalks.



Feels good to be making things again!!

Back to Our Regularly Scheduled Programming.....

Why do all vacations weeks seem to fly by??    I can't believe after all that planning and how long the day was on Monday, that our week is over, we are back home, back to work and back to our summer schedule!

What an AMAZING week.   I could not have asked for anything better.   The hotel was AMAZING, the sun was AMAZING, the kids were AMAZING!! 




Quick run through:   plane delayed 2 hours so we didn't arrive until 1 AM.   We decided day 1 would be a pool day.  WOW, the pools were amazing. {kiddie pools, waterparks, tube slides, lazy rivers}   The hotel was gorgeous and we could have never left!

{this was one of seven towers at the hotel}

Disney was wonderful, but oh so HOT!  It was 103° and 101° while we were at the parks.  Thankfully we rented a stroller so the girls could be under shade, however it also trapped in the heat.



Magic Kingdom was like heaven for the girls.  They loved seeing everything there, we did lots of rides and shows.   They lasted from 9am - 11pm at the park.   Mason left at 6pm as he couldn't take the heat any longer.



Day 2 was spent at Hollywood Studios.  This was the first time for even the adults to be there.  I really thought Mason would love it since it was all about TV and Movies. He did!  We were running all over the park like crazy trying to catch all the shows that happened to be within 5 minutes of each other. 





We waited in line at Toy Story Mania for over 2 hours.  This was one of those moments where we tried to keep the kids having fun and not realizing the time that was passing.  We watched Lights Motors Action and it was amazing....stunt driving at it's best.



When we left this show {3k ppl packed into the stands} Mason yells out "Hey Matthew!"  So here I jump in and say, "Mason, it's not who you think it is, you don't know any of these people"  Boy was I wrong.  "Look Mom, it's Matthew and Mrs. -------"  I couldn't believe it.  We are way up in PA and now at Disney and there is a friend from school.  WOW!

So the last day we quickly packed in the morning and headed to the pool before the car came to pick us up.  Good Bye warm hot sun, amazing pools and rock star hotel.   The drive to the airport was an hour, the kids were so hyped up and not ready to come home at all.   Once we made it to the airport we waited in line to check in and again...."Look!"   There was a friend from Emily's school with his family.  They were on the same plane and sat right in front of us on the way home.    Back in PA, the weekend was dark, cold and wet. YUCK!

 

The only things I had time to make.   I added a red HTV Mickey head to a new pair of swim trunks for Mason {they matched his sisters blue and red polka dot suits} and I used my YUDU to screen the Mickey head on these white backpacks.  They used these bags for autographs from the characters. {the few that we saw}  


Now we are back to washing dishes, sweeping floors and making lunches.  I thought Cinderella stayed in Disney!

Hardest Day Ever!!!

Today is the day we surprise the kids with a trip to Disney.  The car is packed, we have everything ready.   We plan on taking them to lunch at a restaurant near the airport.  Getting lunch and then heading straight there before we break the news.  We have kept this a secret for months!




So when I say this is the hardest day....I mean to keep a straight face, go about our normal day just waiting for the moment to arrive.  EEEK!


I did make a few things to take with us, but being so undercover its been really hard to get pictures to post on here.  I will do my best while we are gone.

Hope you all have a GREAT week!

It turned out perfect!

I did it.  Well, we did it!   Just hours ago I was a little on edge about getting a Father's Day idea to work, and it did!!  I have it all printed, framed and wrapped already.

I saw a picture like this a while ago {no clue where, I can't find it anywhere} and I really wanted to give it a try.  I am so please with how it turned out.   The hub needs an updated pic of these kids badly.  This is PERFECT!



Again...happy weekend and father's day to all!