TUTORIAL: Washi Tape Love Art

Happy Friday Everyone!  Here's another super easy Valentine's craft for y'all.  I really needed some more fun happy heart decor on my mantle...maybe you do too? ;-)

This craft takes only a few inexpensive items you can find at your local craft store and less then 10 minutes of your time, easy peasy lemon squeezy!

Washi Tape 'Love' Art

4 mini wooden easels

4-2.75"x 3.5" mini canvas (or an size similar!) 

washi tape

scissors

heart shaped punch (optional)

scrapbook or construction paper

hot glue gun & glue sticks or glue dots

Grab your crafty items of fun...heart punch, fun washi tape (I bought this cute heart washi through Pick Your Plum...love them!) scissors, scrapbook paper.

Then cut strips of your washi tape to make the letters L, V, E and use your heart punch, or free hand it baby, to make the 'O'.  Hot glue or use glue dots to adhere the heart to the canvas.

Simple and Pretty!

Thanks for stopping by today!

 XOXO,

Handmade Valentine's Cards 2013

With only a week to spare, this year's Valentine's are done, can I get a woot woot!  Have no fear if you are still deciding what to do, the ones we made this year couldn't be easier.

In year's past we have done a similar style Valentine's Card, see here and here to see what I mean (PS. Dang! My kids look so tiny back then!) The kids really look forward to having me take their picture for these which I find darling.  They were asking me about it back in January!

So thanks to the pleading and begging of my children, I had been trying hard to come up with something for their cards this year that included their picture but no candy.  Yeah, such a bummer I am.  Even our Halloween school treats were candy-less this year (play-dough is pretty cool though, right?) And it just so happened that when I was at Hobby Lobby a week ago I came across these uber cool  crazy straws.  Heart shaped?  You had me at hello! 

So, in my cart the cute heart-shaped straws went and off to take pictures we did!  

And then I added some Valentine-y text via Picmonkey. Voila!

Same goes for Noah's card :-)

For his I made his text a bit more boyish...yourwelcomeson. 

I had them printed at Costco and they were ready in an hour, holla!

Then just use a paper punch to punch a hole directly above and below each child's fist and have your child write their name on the back before inserting straw. Valentine's Cards 2013, done and done!

Thanks for stopping by today!

XOXO,

The Sweetheart Dress: Pattern Review and Giveaway

What's more perfect for Valentine's day than to have a sweet little dress to wear to celebrate the day! I don't think much can compare whether you are 4 or 45, am I right?  Well, if you have a little girl in your life between the ages 2-6 you are in luck because there is a pattern for the most adorable dress my good friend Shannon from Luvinthemommyhood created called the Sweetheart Dress.  It is seriously the cutest thing!

The dress is an 18 page digital e-Pattern meaning you print it off right at home on your computer.  The thing I really loved about this pattern is that there were absolutely NO papers to tape together! All the pattern pieces fit on a few pages of paper, hooray for that! 

The pattern is very clear and easy to understand, Shannon did a great job of making sure it was easy for even a beginner seamstress. Her pictures are super detailed and guide you step-by-step in creating your very own dress.  I made both Penny and Ellie's at the same time, assembly line style, and had them both done in right at 2 hours.   

I think the dresses turned out so cute!  My girls are head over heels excited about them.  Penny picked out the fabric and went to bed praying that I would have them done by the morning for her and her sister to wear.

These two sisters.  

They love to dress alike and can I tell you that these dresses have been worn quite often in the short time since I made them :-) I love when something I make them is such a hit!

The dress is constructed really well.  The bodice has the sweetest heart cut-out on the back, I just love it!  The bodice is also fully lined so there are no seams showing on the inside of it.  I chose to use a covered button in Penelope's dress and I hand embroidered a heart in the middle of it.  She really liked that special touch!

For Eloise, I used a wooden heart button I found at Joann's.  I also lined her bodice with a light pink fabric to change the dress up slightly from her sister's.

Can you tell they are happy!

These dresses have a great skirt that is perfect for twirling in too!

And that heart cut-out!  Ah gah, I can't get enough!

If you'd like to purchase your own Sweetheart Dress Pattern click here now!

And now onto the giveaway!
Shannon has been so sweet to offer ONE of my lucky blog readers one of each of her sewing and knit patterns!!  How awesome is that!?

Just to sum that up for you, that includes:

The Sweetheart Dress pattern
The Commuter Cowl pattern
The Hannah Pom Pom knit hat pattern
The Downton Cowl knit pattern
The Camille Hooded Infinity Scarf knit pattern
The Stasia Infinity Cowl knit pattern
The Mallory Reversible Infinity Scarf knit pattern

To enter, use the Raffelcopter link below!
If you can't see the link, click here to enter!

Giveaway ends next Tuesday, Feb 12, 2013

Good Luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway XOXO,

TUTORIAL: Valentine's Advent Calendar

Yup, Yup. I did it. I made another Advent Calendar...Valentine's Style! I don't know about you but I've seen a few of these floating around the internet over the last couple of years and always thought they were a cute idea.  Many of them are done as bunting but we just don't have a whole lot of wall space for that so I finally sat down and figured out a way to put it together that worked best for our home.

This is another "Heart Art" project that is easy to put together and has such a high cute factor that I can't believe I waited so long to get one done! 

Each envelope has a cute little heart inside where I wrote a little somethin' somethin'.  Each one varies from an "experience" to do to a sweet love note to my kids.

Valentine's Advent Calendar

Large piece of foam board 

Small paper envelopes (mine were 3.25"x3.25" squares)

Mini clothespins

Twine or yarn

Glue Dots or Hot Glue or Double Stick Tape

Fiskars paper heart punch

Scrapbook paper

Number stamps and ink pad

Heart Shapes PDF printable (here)

The first thing I did when making my board was to measure out how to evenly space the yarn for each of the 14 envelopes to hang.  I decided I liked them about 6 inches apart. Cut a small slit on both the right and left sides of board for each piece of yarn (making sure they are the same distances from the top of the board!) so the yarn has a place to "hook in to" otherwise the yarn will slowly start to slide down the board with the weight of the envelopes and clothespins. 

Then cut a long enough piece of yarn or twine so that you can lay it across the foam board and hook it into each side slit and still be able to tie it together at the back of the board.

 {the back of the board}

Yay! The board is done!
Now onto the envelopes.  I bought these cute square Kraft paper envelopes and Number stamps at Michael's. They also sell small rectangular envelopes and a plain white style too but the square Kraft paper ones stole my heart! :-)

Punch 14 hearts using your heart punch and scrapbook paper.  I used Glue Dots to attach one to the front side of each envelope, like so.

Then stamp numbers 1-14 in the middle of each heart for each day in February leading up to Valentine's Day.

Using your mini clothespins, hook each envelope to your twine/yarn and you have yourself a sweet little Valentine's Advent Calendar!

You can just use small slips of paper to write your love notes or experiences but of course I had to go one step further.  I made a Heart Shape Printable (found here) and cut 14 out to write on and tuck inside each envelope.

If you are needing ideas of what to write here are the 14 ideas I came up with in no particular order:

1.   Let's make cupcakes!
2.   Daddy date with Penny
3.   Mommy date with Noah
4.   Daddy date with Ellie
5.   You are my sunshine!
6.   We love you all so much! To the moon and back again :-)
7.   Kids choice for dinner tonight!
8.   Here's a kiss for you, my sweeties! (they each get a little bag of Hershey's kisses)
9.   Ice Cream Sundaes for dessert (with pink and red sprinkles)
10. Let's make fingerprint heart art
11. Roses are red, Violets are blue, you are all so loved, you make us cuckoo!
12. This heart is good for one movie of your choice tonight
13. 'Donut' make you happy to know you are loved? (I'll make or buy donuts for breakfast that day)
14. It's Valentine's Day (Heart-shaped pancakes for breakfast!)

Thanks for stopping by today!

 XOXO,

TUTORIAL: "I Choose You" Heart Art

Here is Day 2 of my "Heart Art" Valentine's decor ideas that the kids and I made using my super fun heart punch I found at Joann's last year (I knew that it would be a worthwhile purchase!) This one I like to call, "I Choose You" because of the little itty bitty heart that just happens to be a different color.  Out of all those hearts, that little heart stole mine, haha! I'm so cheesy...but hey, I'm cool with that.

Again, this project could not be simpler to make.  Which is part of the fun, right?  It's nice to be able to make some fun and colorful decor for Valentine's Day without spending too much time and money...me likey that A LOT :-)

"I Choose You" Heart Art

1 Elmer's Foam board or plain canvas

2 pieces of 8.5 x 11" scrapbook paper in red (or color of your choice!)

1 piece of pink scrapbook paper (or color of your choice!)

Heart punch

Hot glue gun and glue sticks

First I cut my scrapbook paper into strips since it's easier to punch them that way.  Then...of course...punch the hearts out of them (and save them for later...you can never have too many hearts!)

I lined up each strip in the middle of my foam board and oh-so-carefully hot glued the edges down.

Soon enough you will have rows and rows of pretty hearts on your foam board or canvas.

Then, take your other color of scrapbook paper and punch out a single heart.  Hot glue it down into one of the empty hearts...whichever spot you choose.

And there you have it, "I Choose You" Heart Art!

Hope you enjoyed this easy Valentine's Craft, more to come later in the week!

And once again, thanks for stopping by today!

 XOXO,

TUTORIAL: Layered Heart Art

Less than one month to Valentine's Day and I think I've got a good start on decorating our home in a pretty large dose of red, pink and all things hearts!  There is just something cheery about those colors in the cold winter months, don't you agree?

I bought a heart punch from Joann's a while back and pulled it out so the kids and I could get our Valentine's craft on last week. This punch is so easy to use, all you need is pretty paper and your home can be decked out in cute little hearts in no time flat. :-) The craft ideas are endless!  The kids and I came up with so many cute craft projects with this punch and I'll show you more ideas later this week!

Layered Heart Art

Fiskars Heart Punch

Colored scrap book paper

Hot glue gun and glue sticks

Elmer's foam board or a plain canvas

 I used foam board from Elmer's but a canvas would look super cute too!

Take your punch and make a whole pile of pretty hearts...the more the merrier in my eyes.

Then lay out your hearts on the foam board.  I glued as I went but in hindsight you may want to outline your heart on the foam or canvas first. My first foray at doing the heart and it was looking pretty weak as you can see above.  I ended up fattening it up and filling it as I went!

Then layer, layer, layer until it's completely covered. I love the layered 3-D effect!

I heart Valentine's decor...yeah, I had to say it! But your with me, right?  It's just pretty!

Thanks for stopping by today!

XOXO,