Tag: crafty

World’s Greatest Farter Father’s Day Gag Gift Tutorial

by kaella, posted in Uncategorized

In our family, we love to pick on each other and have a good laugh.We love to give gag gifts and funny cards. Every family should laugh together and have some fun because life is to short to always be serious.

In typical Dad fashion, my husband spends lots of time in the bathroom which is usually when I need to pee. Doug loves to gross Danyella out by farting next to her and then blame it on her. So she decided she wanted to create a gag gift for him for Father’s Day.

After doing some searching on gag gifts, Danyella decided she wanted to give him a roll of toilet paper and write her jokes to him on the paper. Well you can’t just write on toilet paper. So we came up with the idea of taking one joke and painting it on the toilet paper.

I am sure you will get different results with different toilet paper with different thickness and ply. We used what we had on hand which is soft, thick, double ply toilet paper and acrylic paint. She had to go over the words twice to get the letters to stand out. The black seemed to be thinner which was hard when it soaked into the toilet paper faster than the blue.

If you are looking for a quick and easy gag gift for father’s day or a birthday all you need is: Toilet Paper and Acrylic Paint!

Paint your message on the toilet paper, let it dry, wrap it up and give your gift!

joy

Lucky Penny Picture Frame With Free Father’s Day and Graduation Printable

by kaella, posted in Uncategorized

Lucky Penny DIY Frame

Now that Mother’s Day is over, our next concentration is Father’s Day and Graduation. This frame really can work for a holiday like Father’s Day or celebrations like Graduation or Birthdays. This DIY project is super easy and an affordable gift for a loved one.

The frame is from the dollar store and the pennies are from my wallet and savings jar. The only other thing I needed was a hot glue gun. You can use one of the printables below or have your kids make a special poster for the frame.

For the penny frame, I used a hot glue gun to glue the initial row of pennies then staggered the top row to give it a unique look. You can replace the pennies with nuts and bolts, golf tees or something else related to Dad’s hobbies.

For the Dad Printable: Father’s Day Lucky Dad Printable

Let ourchildren play

For the Graduation Printable: Happy Graduation Printable

Happy Graduation

DIY Ribbon Bookmark plus May Writing Prompt Calendar

by kaella, posted in Uncategorized

DIY Ribbon Bookmark Tutorial

Hooray its May! After a cold, snowy Winter and wet, rainy April…. we have sunshine on the first day of May! Add to that the fact that its Teach Me Tuesday and you have a near perfect day!

This week’s Teach Me Tuesday is for our readers and writers, young and old with a DIY tutorial to make ribbon bookmarks plus a writing prompt for the month of May. If you know someone (including yourself) that loses bookmarks every time they read then this is the perfect bookmark to make!

The bookmark is very cute and customizable with the type of ribbon and buttons you want to use. You can use recycled ribbon from gift boxes or other places you find ribbon. If you are like me, you find buttons everywhere but don’t know where they came from so you can use those buttons for this project. The great thing about these bookmarks is that they created so they do not slip out the books and get lost. For the May Writing Prompt, keep scrolling past the bookmark tutorial!

Supplies:

Ribbon

Buttons

Hair Tie (preferably new but you can recycle your unused ones too)

Hot Glue Gun and glue stick

Directions

  1. Cut ribbon to 12″ long or as long you want/need
  2. Place hair tie over one side of the ribbon, fold the ribbon over the tie and glue down
  3. Glue the button on the other side of the ribbon
  4. Allow the glue to dry
  5. Read and bookmark your place!

May Writing Prompt:

As a homeschooling mom, I love having Danyella write something everyday. The writing prompts are a great way to get the creative juices flowing and sometimes make her think outside of the box. In the past, we have used prompts that I have found on Pinterest. While we loved them, there was something usually missing from them. Danyella prefers to have the prompts in a calendar form which has been a great way to teach her about calendars and planning.

This May writing prompt is formatted for 2018 but can be used at any point, in any year. I hope you enjoy getting your child’s creative juices flowing and encouraging them to use their words to write something beautiful everyday of May!

Here is the PDF to print off: May Writing Prompt and the JPG:

May Writing Prompt

If you like this prompt please share the picture below to Pinterest or your favorite social media!May Writing Prompt (1)

 

St. Patrick’s Day Quote Sharpie Mug DIY

by kaella, posted in Uncategorized

Irish Quotesharpie mug

One of my favorite holidays is St. Patty’s Day because there is so much more behind the day besides green beer and dressing in green. This day began as a celebration of Christianity arriving in Ireland with a day of feast. Since the first St. Patty’s Day, this holiday has become one of the most celebrated around the world. It is celebrating the luck of the Irish, the good fortune life has brought into our lives and looking forward to the greatness the future holds for us.

Now, I am not Irish or at least that I know of but my 3 older children are Irish on their father’s side so I have embraced celebrating this holiday for them. I love to make brisket and cabbage with soda bread. I am not a beer drinker but I will do enjoy drinking some Bailey’s Irish Cream in my coffee. Of course, we dress in green and decorate the house in a fun Irish way with shamrocks and rainbows.

I LOVE and collect fun coffee mugs but haven’t found one for my St. Patty’s “special” coffee or one that was affordable (sorry I won’t pay $10-$20 for a cool mug unless its keeping my coffee hot for hours). I decided to take matters into my own hands and make my own Irish inspired mug.

Something else I love is quotes which includes Irish Blessings. I have some Irish Blessings that are displayed in my house year round because they have a special meaning that I cherish. These blessings are so beautiful and inspiring that I wanted one on a mug for the special day for my special coffee.

I grabbed my sharpie markers and bought an affordable, white mug from Walmart to do this Sharpie Irish Mug project. A lot of people prefer to use Sharpie oil-based Paint Markers but regular markers will work just as well and less of a mess for kids to make a mug of their own. The difference in the permanent marker and paint marker is you will want hand wash the permanant marker whereas you can put the paint marker mug in the dishwasher,

I chose “May Your Day Be Touched With A Bit of Irish Luck”which started on one end of the mug and wrapped to the other end. Then I added a shamrock, a rainbow and a pot of gold. I wish y green sharpie would have been brighter but it was still cute.

This is the tricky part… for permanent markers set your mug on a cookie sheet in the oven THEN turn the oven to 350 degrees. Once the oven reaches 350 degrees, bake the mug for 30 minutes. After the 30 minutes, turn the oven off but DO NOT take the mug out of the oven until it is completely cooled so that the mug doesn’t crack from cooling to fast. I usually keep the mug in the oven for at least an hour. For Paint markers, you will want to do the same instructions EXCEPT the oven will be set to 250 degrees for 30-40 minutes depending on how thick you applied the paint.

Now its time to wash your mug, enjoy some special coffee and celebrate St. Patty’s Day!

Kids Tissue Paper Heart Craft

by kaella, posted in Handmade Gifts

Today’s Teach me Tuesday is for the kids but adults can have making these too. With Valentine’s Day only a couple weeks away, I wanted to do a cute craft that kids could make and give as a gift or use to decorate their room. Plus, after the baby shower I have a TON of tissue paper because I just can’t throw it away so I am recycling it.

Now depending on the age(s) of the child(ren) making this craft will determine how much help they will need from an adult. An adult will need to cut a heart shape from cardboard which I used an exacto knife to do. For younger kids, an adult will need to cut the tissue paper into small squares.

Supplies:

Heart shaped cardboard cutout, tissue paper squares 2″x2″s, Elmer’s liquid glue, paint brush and string or yarn.

Directions:

Cut the heart out of the cardboard and put a hole at the top to put the string through later.

Cut the tissue paper into 2″x 2″ squares.

With the pain brush put a little bit of glue at a time on the heart so it doesn’t dry to fast.

Take the tissue square and squish it to create the texture and put it on the glue.

Keep doing these 2 steps until the entire heart is filled but make sure you don’t cover the hole at the top.

Once dry, thread the string through the hole and tie into a loop.

Now the heart is ready to be a gift or decoration.

This is a great way to let kids get creative with colors and make a handmade item.

Upcycle Old Sweaters into New Slippers

by kaella, posted in Uncategorized

Anyone who wears sweaters, has old sweaters that are out of shape, dull in color or out of style. I love to take old items that most people throw away and make it something new again. For the next 2 Teach Me Tuesday posts, I will be showing you how to upcycle an old sweater into something new just using the sweater, scissors, yarn and a yarn needle!

Today we are upcycling an old sweater into new slippers which are cozy and cute! My best tip is to use a machine knit sweater because they don’t unravel as easily as a handmade sweater.

Step 1: Cut the sleeves off of the sweater.

Step 2: Take a pair of shoes or flip flops to cut the sweater to create the soles for the slippers. You can use a marker to trace and cut the soles as well.

Step 3: Line up the sole to the cut end of the sleeve. I did pin them together just to make it easier for me. You might need to stretch the sleeve end to fit the sole.

Step 4: Cut a large length of yarn and sew the sole and sleeve together. I used a stitch that wrapped the yarn across the edge of the two pieces by threading the yarn through the yarn loop. You can use any stitch that is easy for you. For added strength, you can stitch 2 rounds.

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Step 5: this is optional! I added a weave of yarn at the top of the sleeve so I can tighten the top if I want to wear them different ways.

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Now I have a new pair of slippers for this snowy night we are going to have in New Jersey! Next week, I will be taking more of the same sweater to make mittens so be sure to stay tuned!

DIY Dollar Store Advent Calendar

by kaella, posted in Uncategorized

see & explore

I grew up enjoying the chocolate filled advent calendars which my kids and have adopted the advent calendar tradition. These advent calendars are hot commodities in my area and sell out very quickly so we have learned to be on the hunt for them. Last week, Danyella and I went into Hobby Lobby and found the calendars…

They wanted $8 for an advent calendar that was smaller than the ones we have bought in the past. No way was I going to pay $8 for cheap chocolate in a cardboard box! That is just absurd inflation when I could make a better one for the same price or cheaper.

So, I headed to my favorite place for cheap crafts…. The Dollar Store! I purchased snowflake printed zip bags, small bags of Danyella’s favorite candies, a pair of socks (she loves penguins), lipsmackers, holiday bracelets and holiday erasers. Plus I had some holiday kisses to use as well. All of these would be fun treats for her to open once a day and better than the overpriced advent calendar. I already had leftover wrapping paper, tape and a cardboard box to cut up and I printed the numbers through my Google Docs account. So I spent a total of $7 plus tax for our DIY advent calendar!

Materials:

wrapping paper

cardboard box (cut into the size/shape you desire)

tape (I preferred double-sided but you can use regular clear tape)

printed numbers 1-24

fun goodies for 24 days

zip lock baggies

Directions:

  1. Create 1-24 and cut each number out than tape them to the bags
  2. Fill the bags with your goodies
  3. Wrap the piece of cardboard with the wrapping paper
  4. Create row with the tape to stick the bags (I created 3 rows starting with 24 at the top and ending with 1)
  5. Press the baggies onto the tape for the kids to peel off each day
  6. Place your advent calendar on display and start on December 1st

Vacation Savings Jar DIY #savingsunday

by kaella, posted in Couponing and Saving, Uncategorized

savings jar

This week we are getting hands on with our savings by making a savings jar! The kids love this part because we hit Michaels and the Dollar Store for fun stickers and a jar. I like to pick out a jar with the chalkboard stickers because we can write where we are going and a countdown on the sticker.

The kids love to decorate with the stickers and talk about how we can save money for the cool trip. They can come up with some awesome ideas on how they can help us save money. Usually it consists of giving up a favorite food they like to eat so it is one less thing to purchase in the grocery order or giving up toys or other things to sell on the yard sale groups. I love hearing them get into all of this and it gives them satisfaction to be a participant in the vacation planning and saving instead of the adults telling them what we are doing and how we are saving for it.

Our jar is Disney themed but you can find cool beach, camping and other destination stickers and you can reuse the jar by taking the stickers off using Goo-Gone or soap and hot water which saves for the next trip. Even if you are using this for your spending money on the trip, it teaches the kids how to save and have fun doing it.

What are you going to put on your Vacation Savings Jar?

vacationkids

Halloween or Fall DIY Glass Pumpkins Decor Under $8 #teachmetuesday

by kaella, posted in Uncategorized

DIY Glass Pumpkin BowlsUnder $8It’s Teach Me Tuesday and we are continuing our Halloween/Fall theme with DIY Glass pumpkins which you can make 2 for under $8! These pumpkins are cute for your porch, table or another place in your house. If you opt to get plastic bowls or can trust your child with Glass (even with the 10-year-old I am weary) you can have he kids participate in making these pumpkins!

Originally, I was going to do one pumpkin and one leaf bowl but our leaves went from green to a yucky brown so it was not even worth the attempt. Some of supplies came from the Dollar store which were the 2 glass bowls and the package of 2 battery-powered tea lights. The Modge Podge, foam brush and tissue paper came from Michaels. The price breakdown: bowls $2, lights $1, Modge Podge $2.50 (40% off coupon used), brush $.50 and tissue paper pack $1= 7! Plus, I have enough to supplies to pick up a couple of more bowls and make more for the Thanksgiving Decor or if I get other tissue paper, they would make a cute gift! img_2148

Directions:

Cut the tissue paper into small squares, rectangles or any other shape you desire

When applying the Modge Podge to the tissue paper on the glass, I always dab the Modge Podge on first to create a sticky surface.

Then, I sponge the Modge Podge over the piece of tissue paper to help the paper soak it up.

Next, I swipe the Modge Podge over the paper to ensure it’s stuck on the glass. For the Jack-O-Lantern, I added the black triangles after the layer of orange was placed down on the glass. Note: A little Modge Podge goes a long way!

After allowing them to dry for a few hours, I placed the tea lights in the bowls and enjoyed them.

Photo Oct 17, 2 13 07 PM

Baby Evelynne’s Rainbow Dragonfly Blanket

by kaella, posted in Creativity, Uncategorized

Since Evelynne is our Rainbow Baby (if you don’t know what a Rainbow Baby is I will explain below), I knew that her color theme would be Rainbow for her first blanket but it was finding a pattern and yarn that were going to be the hard part. When it came to patterns, I didn’t want the “new” chevron fade blanket because it didn’t impress that much (currently singing Shania Twain in my head now) or a Granny Square because it just was to old fashioned. As far as yarn, I was assuming that I would buy the different skeins of colors I wanted to use…. until the Lion Brand Mandala yarn came onto the market! (This is going to be a whole lot of gushing about this yarn but it not paid or sponsored or anything like that just my opinion and love of this yarn BUT if you do click my link to purchase the yarn, I could be compensated for your purchase)
Back in the Spring, the Mandala yarn came on to the market in select Walmart stores (none were even a driving distance of me) and the ones online sold within minutes. Yarn lovers were in their glory over this yarn.

Now, Caron had similar yarn called Caron Cakes then Hobby Libby’s brand started making their own cakes but both were a 4 thickness compared to Mandala’s light and airy 3 thickness. I do have a bunch of cakes and have created vests and clothing from both brands but the moment I saw the Mandala yarn at my Walmart (I had given up on waiting), touched its soft, soothing texture and found Gnome (rainbow colored) I knew I found my yarn for Evelynne’s blanket. Now for a pattern….

Lion Brand Yarn 525-209 Mandala Yarn, Gnome

 Click the image or text to find the Lion Brand Mandala Yarn in Gnome

I joined a Mandala Lover’s Facebook group and as I browsing the amazing creations people made with this yarn I found it… I found the pattern! This dragonfly baby blanket was exactly what I wanted to make with my amazing new yarn. A dragonfly represents change in most cultures which having Baby Evelynne is a major change for our family in the happiest of ways.

I will admit I did change the pattern a little bit to fit the flow of my hands a little more. This is a super easy pattern that beginners can pick up easily. You can find the pattern at Charmed By Ewe 

So what is a Rainbow Baby? A rainbow baby is a baby born after a miscarriage (or multiple miscarriages), stillbirth or infancy death. It basically means that this baby is the hope and light after a storm. Anyone that has dealt with the loss of a baby that they were never able to meet or only held for a short time deals with a storm of emotions and floods of tears. This is the parents “pot of gold” at the end of the rainbow because we get to hold and love our “Rainbow Baby”.

Overall, I love this pattern and yarn and the final product! It only took 1 1/2 cakes (that is the name for this type of yarn compared to skein) which means I have some of this yarn to create something else for Baby Evelynne which means I am on the hunt for a new pattern! Anyone have a suggestion or idea for a small baby item I can crochet or knit?

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