GreenChicken31

Merry Christmas!

If you haven't tried making your own crayons from old crayon scraps yet, I totally suggest you make them.  They make wonderful little Christmas gifts, especially if you don't have a lot of spare $. Directions: 1. Find some sad old crayons that could use some loving... 2. Break them into little bits and put them in a cupcake molds or a an ice cube tray if it can stand up to heat.  There are so many cute ones out there now. 3. Preheat your oven to 225 F and put them in for 15-17 minutes.  It's fun to watch them melt... 4. Take them out of the oven and let them cool for a while. 5.  Pop them out and wrap them up in some creative fashion and give! Not all of mine came out of the mold successfully...so I just let them melt again and tried to pop them out a bit more carefully.

I had Moose's playgroup friends over to make the snowmen and boy were they a hit! Some were more interested in making them then others. =) But I just love how they all came out!

Here is Moose's snowman...or snowlady?  Since she is just 15months, I had to keep it simple for her, so she just finger painted the eyes and nose and watched mommy do all the rest.  We are making them for when her play friends come over, which I thought was today, but turns out is next Tuesday, ops! They are super easy to make and here is how. What you need: Paper Tube Pipe cleaners Felt Pompoms Paint Directions: 1. Cute your tube to desired height 2. Paint it white and let it dry 3. Make a cute hat for your snowman while he dries 4. Punch some a hole on each side for the pipe cleaner arms and stick them in (you can let your little one stick the pipe cleaner in if they have the coordination for it) 5. Let them paint some eyes, nose, maybe some buttons, or a little scrap felt for a scarf 6. Let dry and enjoy!

I'm making a bunch of tiny hats. Lots of them.  These cute little hats are for Moose's playgroup.  We are going to be making the cutest little snowman on Tuesday and I can't wait to see how they will turn out! I still don't have a clue were my scanner's power cord is...so I took a picture of my templates for the hats in case you want to make some too.  To give a sense of scale, the bottom of the two pointed hat should be about 3 1/4 inches.

So while I was up late making some mini apple pies in my cupcake pan (they turned out marvelous by the way), I made these cute napkin rings. The napkin rings started out because I had these cute foam shapes and I got them all for 88 cents!  Even after our 10% tax it was still less then a dollar.  Yay!   I knew I had to make something with them.  So I finished up a paper towel roll and cut them into lots of rings.   Then I painted them some lovely fall colors.  I think I did three coats. Then all I had to do was stick the foam turkeys on and they were the sticker kind so I didn't have to use my hot glue gun. I just love happy napkin rings, especially when they cost me less then a dollar to make them all.    I hope everyone had a very happy thanksgiving!  

This is a quick and simple leaf banner that is great for keeping your fireplace decorated till thanksgiving and it is super simple to make. All you need is some felt, ribbon, and some embroidery floss. I cut out a bunch of of acorns, maple leaves, and oak leaves (remember you need 2 each for front and back!).  I wanted to put up my template but I have no idea where my scanner's power cord is.  If your backyard is filled with oaks and maples then just grab some fallen leaves and trace them...or look for leave images online and uses them as templates. Just making a bunch like this and spreading them out on a thanksgiving table would look awesome. Now I just sewed the backs on with my sewing machine.  Now you can embroider the front for some details on the leaves or keep them simple. Then sew them to the backs or glue if you are in a time pinch. I just love the oak leaves. Then hang them up! Enjoy!

I could just be crazy, but I had little Moose's playgroup over and I thought it would be fun to make crafts with a bunch of young toddlers.  This is a simple craft, but it can get messy with the finger paint. What you need: white paper brown paper a little bit of orange paper finger paint scissors googly eyes or a some other creative things for eyes glue Steps: 1. Now you can do these one of two ways.  You can take your toddler's hand and cover it in paint and press it on the paper to make a hand print, or you can let them go crazy and just paint away on a piece of paper and then trace your toddlers hand and cut it out when it has dried. 2. Cut a big brown circle for the body and cut a smaller brown circle for the head and glue them on.   3. Cut out a little orange triangle for the beak and some feet and glue them on. 4. Pick out some stylish eyes for your little turkey and stick them on and you're done! For my playgroup, I went and made all the turkey bodies ahe...

In a week I'm expecting our nice new couch to arrive.  I can't wait for it come, because I hate the couches that we currently have, but they were free so I can't hate them too much.  Our current couches are much too country plaid for my tastes, and what is coming is black and modern.  Anyways, I made these pillows because I think they will make for a fun and whimsical addition to our couch.  It also gave me a chance to practice sewing zippers in, which I apparently stink at. Little Moose is having a blast with them.  She doesn't mind the imperfections at all.

So my little Moose is all ready getting invited to birthday parties, crazy!  I didn't have to much time to come up with this card so I had to keep it simple, but it did give me a chance to play with my new Copic markers.  Yay! What little one year old boy wouldn't want to open this?  Poor sock monkey looks like he is being strangled, oh well!

It took me a while, but I finally finished putting up my photo wall.  I've been wanting to do this for so long, but I wasn't sure how to go about it.  It always looks great when I lay it on the floor, but everything gets off when I hang it up.  So for a week or two I had newspaper rectangles on the wall, which made for an interesting conversation starter when I had little Moose's playgroup over.  Then I found the 3M photo hanging strips and boy did that help me.  I never have had any luck when nailing a nail in the wall.  My nails would always be a bit high or a bit low and same thing when I used the hooks, but now I could just stick the picture on the wall and it stuck right where I wanted it.  I don't know why I never had seen them before. The last piece that made it up was this photo box that now has the origami cranes in it.  For the longest time I couldn't decide what was to go here.   I love making origami crane...