Chalkboard Gift Tags Tutorial

I’m incorporating a chalkboard into Tabi’s birthday party, and I wanted to make some chalkboard tags to go with it for the kids’ goody bags. A new friend of mine was sooooooo generous to let me borrow her Cricut, and I am HEAD OVER HEELS IN LOVE with this machine! (BIG THANK YOU IF YOU’RE READING THIS E!) It can do everything. Really! Remember my post last year about how to make scalloped paper? Well forget that if you have a Cricut! Although they cost a couple hundred, I truly think it’s worth it especially if you like to craft. I can totally see me using this when my kids are in school, and I need to make gifts, cards, or things for school. I’m hinting towards the hubs that I want this for my Christmas present. Too bad you can’t use a Joanns coupon on Cricut machines or their cartridges. I’ve seen great deals on cartridges on Craigslist. Not sure I would trust buying a Cricut machine through CList, but I have seen some go for decent prices.

Cricut in action –

I used the tag function and cut 12×12 cardstock to 4 1/4″ tall tags.

Perfectly cut tags!

I spray painted the backs of the tags yesterday with Krylon Chalkboard Spray Paint. I didn’t get to take a picture of that, but here is the back sides of the tag. After the tags dried, I flipped them over to spray paint the other side.

Waiting for the last side to dry. I only sprayed each side once.

And here is the final product –

It’s a super easy project, and it can be a fun activity for your kids to draw with chalk INSIDE the house versus giving them chalk to draw on the sidewalk. I spray painted a piece of cardstock for my toddler, and she’s been having fun with drawing on her new chalkboard. It lasted about 10 minutes, but hey it’s something new for her and reusable which is always a plus!

-lil sis

PVC Piping Backdrop Tutorial

So I’ve been on the hunt to find a tutorial on how to make a PVC Piping Backdrop. I heard it’s fairly simple, and you don’t need any crazy tools to build one. I’ve asked hubby (nicely) to make this for me this weekend even though he caught my nasty cold, so I’m super excited to take some step by step photos as I can’t seem to find a tutorial on the web that includes pictures. So far, I like the one from Wedding Bee.

I keep telling myself it’s worth it to make this backdrop for Tabi’s birthday party. I can always use it for years to come, right?

Wish us luck!

-lil sis

Car seat canopy + window!

I just finished sewing up a car seat canopy. Lil sis used one of her swaddling blankies as a makeshift canopy on our outings together when Tabi needed to nap so I figured it was worth sewing one up!

The best part about it is the window! Instead of having my kids lift up the sides and waking the baby up, I figured we could all just peek in through the window. Genius!

Here’s where I got the tutorial. I didn’t make any adjustments to it.! Granted baby #3 is not here yet and I don’t know if it works as it should but for now, it looks perfect!

Perfect for when we plan to walk to pick up the twinsies from Kinder. I am so nervous for them…more than they will ever know! If baby #3 wasn’t coming the day after they start school, I would wait outside the fence just so I can catch a glimpse of them while they are out for recess or having lunch. Full stalker in effect! Could you imagine?! haha! Better yet, I would just volunteer everyday! Maybe baby #3’s birth is a blessing in disguise…

big sis

Floor Cushion inspired by Land of Nod

I was SOOOOO ecstatic when I found this tutorial on how to make a Land of Nod inspired Floor Cushion. Land of Nod’s cushion looks like this…

Serena and Lily has a square version of a floor cushion/chair…

With the tutorial, I made this happy, colorful floor cushion/chair/whatever you want to call it!

It has its own handle, so the lil one can carry it around wherever she wants.

And of course, it has many uses.

Works as a floor cushion

Works as a sitting area for all her duckies…

And it works as a way to block her from getting out of time out. I tried giving her a time out this morning, and it didn’t work.  You can’t tell from this picture, but she was giggling away and babbling to herself like we were playing a game.

I bought this home decor fabric from Superbuzzy. It’s called International Patchwork, and I love the lil matryoshkas scattered about!

I have to say the tutorial was easier than it looked. I got stuck on cutting out a 17″ circle because I didn’t have a compass handy, and I did not want to go out and buy one. So…I made a circle by hand. I drew a middle point at 8.5″ (half of 17″) and measured many, many, MANY points 8.5″ out. I then connected those points to make a circle. Tedious, yes, but it saved me a trip to Staples and some $!

I’m still waiting for my HK fabric to mod podge on my table. This is what I get when ordering from Japan. Shipping takes way too long! I wish I could find a local seller, but big sis and I have looked and had no luck.

-lil sis

How to make a succulent terrarium

To piggyback on big sis’ post about not being able to “sit still”…this is what we did on a HOT Monday morning.

MAKE TERRARIUMS! Read more here.

 

Double theme birthday party!

I completely lost track of time and lil sis reminded me a few weeks ago that I am running out of time and must send the twin’s birthday party invitations! Now, I know what etiquette says about when to send out wedding invitations, baby shower and bridal shower invitations but what is appropriate for your average kid’s b-day party??? I ended up giving 3 weeks…I figure it’s probably a tad bit too much time but better to be early than late, I say.

So the theme. Minnie Mouse and Star Wars. ??? WHAT?! How? Is it possible to combine the two forces? It’s all too strange. I got lucky b/c we are again having it elsewhere so I do not need to worry about prepping for games, pinatas, major decorations. phew!

First step: the invitations. I made TWO different invitations…Minnie went to the girls and Darth Vader went to the boys, for obvious reasons. Who cares if they have the same set of friends 🙂 Unfortunately, this led to alot of confusion amongst the parents.

“Are they not having a joint party?”

“Why aren’t you celebrating it together?”

“Are you having 2 parties?”

sigh…

Here are the their invitations. I could have done a simple, cute flat card but I’m ol’ school and still piecing together paper, scrapbook style.  There are a few people on Ebay and Etsy doing this card; it can be a bit time consuming if you are making a bunch but completely doable if you only have to make 10 (my own limit). I started with a template.

I purchased black 6 x 6 square envelopes and enlarged Minnie’s head until it fit snugly into the envelope. Then the hard part. You could trace the template onto your black cardstock with a white pencil but I didn’t want to deal with having to cut PERFECTLY and/or erasing anything so I scored it…with a chopstick! like so…

(we’ll get to this image in a bit) Excuse the popping veins; you really have to press hard to get the lines to show on black paper 🙂

I found a Minnie/Mickey font and also sized the wording so that it would fit perfectly in the center of her head.

Next? the fun part. Accessorizing her! Machine sewed up a bunch of tiny bows and then hand sewed the bows in the center.

So cute!

I had a very hard time with the whole Star Wars theme. Yes, again could have done a simple, flat card but I wanted to keep it consistent with my daughter’s invites so I found an image online (as shown above) and blew it up so that it too would fit snugly in the 6 x 6 envelope. Same for the wording…adjust the size, print, cut out the shape, and then glue them on to the cardstock.

Here’s where the problem lies for these invites. The color combo. Sure, they matched Minnie’s but they probably would have looked much better if the inner paper was a dark grey. Little do I know…I could NOT get anything to show up on the dark grey paper! I panicked, researched, and learned something about ink and your printer and yada, yada, yada. Had some vellum leftover from previous invites and ended up using those. They look a bit “skeletor” in my opinion but I had to work with what I have.

Next up…the birthday banner, the party favors, oh and I’m going to attempt to make something I have seriously been ooo-ing and ahh-ing about and I cannot believe I didn’t know about her and her thingies. All to come…

big sis

p.s., these pictures were taken with my old camera 🙂

Update: the template is finally up here! Yay!

“Visual” Tutorial on Heather Ross’ Adult Mendocino Sundress

Gosh, it was not this hard with my daughter’s sundress. It took alot of concentration and ALOT of researching but I finally finished my sundress. Perfect, now that the weather is so cold here! ugh! Us SoCal people think 70 degree weather is a bit on the chilly side (or is it just me?) Anyways, it turned out just the way I had envisioned but it went through many trims and cuts (and a lil bit of swearing)! So the biggest thing I found while researching this pattern/dress was that people wanted more instruction than the one provided. And while I had good intentions (as always), my tutorial may not be as thorough as desired 🙂 Let me tell you why and then we’ll get started.

1. this pattern is not made for a skinny minnie. I’m on the thinner side and the X-small pattern just did not cut it for me, despite cutting it a half inch smaller. You’ll know what I’m talking about in a bit.

2. b/c of #1, once I completed the dress, it looked a bit like a muumuu…not the look I was going for. So I took in the sides and shaped it a bit more…just so I didn’t look like I was wearing a tent.

3. lastly, damn the shirring! I swear that my daughter’s dress smocked more than mine but after a few attempts, this is the best I was able to get it.

For all these reasons, my frustration got the best of me and at some point, I stopped taking step-by-step pictures 😦

NOTE: This tutorial is on the dress WITHOUT the pockets. Also, I will be using the words “smocking” and “shirring” interchangeably.

So here we go…

Step 1: Print the pattern. I tried to “tile” it, as suggested, but never worked. Took it to Kinko’s and had it printed for $5.71. Worth the labor of trying to piece together 20 sheets of paper, I say.

So here is what I was talking about above. The dotted line represents a size XS-S but I figured I would need to go a bit smaller than a “generalized” XS-S. Afterall, that is a big range, in my opinion. So I cut it a 1/2 inch smaller. I was going for an above-the-knee length so I immediately trimmed the bottom as well.

Step 2: After washing and drying your fabric, I folded my fabric in half, placed the pattern sheet on top, pinned it, and cut it.

Do this step twice.

Step 3: Pin the dress right sides together.

And you should end up with something like this.

***make a mental note of this picture as I will be referring to it later in regards to the shape of the dress***

Step 5: Sew sides together. I used a 1/4 inch seam. And if you are lucky enough to have a serger, serge away. And if not, you can zig zag stitch like I did. I found that pressing your seams after helps keep everything nice and tailored.

Step 6: With fabric wrong side up, turn and press with your iron the top raw edge 1/4 inch to the wrong side all the way around, and then again. Don’t sew yet as you will be attaching straps at the end.

Step 7: It is suggested in the lil girl’s version to start marking smocking lines 1 inch below the edge of the pressed crease. However, I started 3/4 of the way (personal preference). I continued to mark lines 1/2 inch apart until it reached 5 inches. At that point, I tried on the dress to check visually how much I wanted the top to be shirred and adjusted accordingly. The pattern suggest anywhere from 6-8 inches (again, personal preference)

Step 8: The oh-so-fun part! Loosely wind your elastic thread around your bobbin. The difference between my daughter’s dress and mine was the color and make of the elastic thread. Now, I don’t think that it could have the color itself that would have affected the shirring…I’m wondering if it was the different brand???

Here is where I start to lose it a bit. After pulling out the first line (b/c I thought that it should smock up a bit more), I gave in after 2 tries. It was either the different brand or the cotton that caused the “less smocking”. The instructions do not state how to end off at each row. So here’s what I did…when you get to the end, I overlapped a few stitches, left a tail, and then knotted it with the starting tail about 3 times.

Step 9: The fun part. Spray the smocked area (really wet it) and with a HOT iron, press the smocked area. The stitches should shrink up further.

Step 10: Press the bottom hem, just as you did for the top.

Sew the hem. NOTE: you should probably pin your hem but I just went for it 🙂

Step 11: I purchased bias tape b/c I didn’t want to make it this time around and it saved me so much time. Since I opted for halter staps, I left my bias tape in one piece, folded in half, tucked it inside the top edge hem and sewed it. Wish I had a picture to go along with this but here’s what the end result looked like.

This part was tricky b/c the area was so thick. I had to go real slow to make sure I caught the bias tape, plus the folded hem.

Here’s what the front looks like.

As mentioned above, it looked a lil muumuu like so before I sewed the bottom hem (which I had to trim and adjust as well), I took in the sides. I think that if you were using a soft jersey type cotton, the pattern itself would be perfect. And although my fabric is lightweight cotton, it just didn’t drape the way I would have liked and it seemed big on me. After taking it in (I took it in almost a 1/2 inch starting from the bottom of the smocked area and almost 1 1/2 towards the bottom) , it’s a bit more form fitting but flowy, if that makes any sense.

And here is my Mendocino Sundress. I am officially ready for Hawaii. We are leaving in less than a week and this was my project to complete so I could throw it over my swimwear!

special thanks to my 3-year-old twins for taking this picture (this was the best one). Otherwise, you would have never seen the dress in its entirety!

LAST NOTE: I wore this dress around the house today and the smocked area was just too loose. Despite the straps, it just did not feel secure. So I ripped the top apart and made spaghetti straps. sigh. MUCH better. You better believe this dress will be the only outfit I take…after all this work! sheesh! Here’s the revised top.

Aloha!

big sis

Crazy for tutus. Part Deux.

So for all of you who don’t have a sewing machine OR don’t know how to use one OR too lazy to pull yours out of the closet 🙂 but would love to make a tutu for your lil girl, lil sis and I did all the research and found a great tutorial on making a “no sew tutu”. I am all about tutorials with lots of pictures and step-by-step instructions. There are tons of versions out there but we really liked Plumtickled‘s “how-to”.

Lil sis is currently working on her daughter’s 1st birthday invitation, and it’s a ladybug/garden theme. So, here is lil Lila in her no sew ladybug tutu.

She used black elastic for the waistband with red tulle and made the black pom poms out of yarn which were then glued on. You don’t need a sewing machine or a pom pom maker tool to make this, so it’s not too late to make your daughter a Halloween costume or a “just because” tutu. So SO SOOO adorable. She even made her a ladybug barrette. The plain black long sleeve shirt is from Walmart. Lil sis added the tuxedo frills by cutting black strips from an old black shirt and gathered them using the long stitch, similar to previous posts on gathering. She then sewed them on to the shirt – the middle strip being two inches longer than the side strips. Just a lil something to turn a plain black shirt into something frilly.

Thankfully, my daughter decided not to be the risque cat (I would have toned it down much MUCH more. Pu-lease, no need to start them off on this path THIS early or EVER, for the matter). After perusing through the Pottery Barn Kids catalog, she insisted that she will be this (and hasn’t changed her mind for the past few weeks)…

{via PBK}

$69. WHAT! I better be getting that cat treat bag, the ballet slippers, the white picket fence, pumpkins, you can forget the crow. So, I decided to piece the costume together, starting with the tutu skirt. PBK’s skirt was a lil blah so I used the no sew tutu method and fluffed it up a bit!

Ok, so you know how I’m a bit impatient? Couldn’t wait for my daughter to wake up, try it on, take pictures, load them up, post them in blog SO…that is me, holding up the skirt, taking the picture on timer-mode. gotta love me! It won’t be that full on her (don’t think I didn’t try to put it on myself!). I promise to show you her complete outfit once I’m done.

After her costume is done, I will have to price things up and see how much I saved 🙂

TUTU TIP #1: After a test run, lil sis found that it was really bare when using one layer of tulle so we both used 2 layers of 6 inch pieces. The lengths obviously differed. She wanted Lila’s to be really fluffy so she used 2 layers all around. I wanted my daughter’s to be less full so I alternated between 2 layers, then 1. Hope that makes sense.

TUTU TIP #2: The tutorial calls for 2 yards of tulle, but lil sis and I used almost 4 yards (from the doubling of layers).

Next on the list of things to do? I will be adding some sequins to her cat ears headband and spicing up her black shirt.

big sis

Tutorial: How to make scalloped paper

No need to spend money on fancy scalloped paper for scrapbooking or for making a garland because it’s pretty darn easy to get the same look by making it yourself. All you need is:

*Plain paper (I just took a piece of paper from my printer – 8 1/2×11)
*Scissors
*Round shaped object to make your scallops (I used a spool of thread)
*Paper for tracing the scallops

1.) Fold your plain piece of paper into a strip. I didn’t do accordian style. I simply kept folding over. You can make your scallops wide by folding into larger strips or make them thin by folding into smaller strips.

2.) I had some extra paper remaining that I just cut off.

3.) Trace your round object on the edge of both sides of the strip. If you don’t have a spool of thread, you can use any object around the house – Tylenol Bottle, bottom of a vase, nail polish bottle, etc. Look in your bathroom…I’m sure you’ll find something!

4.) Cut your scallops

5.) Your paper will look like this

6.) Begin tracing the scallops on your clean sheet of paper.

TIP #1: I didn’t trace directly on my scrapbook paper because I wanted to do a trial run first. I traced on a thicker piece of paper that I now use as my template.
Tip #2: Do not trace on the edges of the paper. Leave enough room so that you can trace the scallops on the sides as well.

7.) When you are ready to make the corners of the scallop, first make a line somewhat down the middle of the last scallop on your pattern (see my line on the white paper). That line should match up against where you stopped your tracing. This will be your guide to make the corner a perfect rounded circle. The corners are tricky so experiment. Maybe use a pencil instead of a pen?

8.) I made a 7×7 square template to make a photo garland.

The end.

P.S. I cut out circles with a scalloped edge as well for the garland, but I just made a template by drawing free hand. I used my square template to guide me, so I don’t really have a tute on that. After her birthday, this bad boy is going straight to her room!

lil sis

**Preview of the treat bags still in major progress**

lil sis

Trio of Elephants Baby Shower Invitation Tutorial

I’m planning a baby shower with some of my other friends for my bestie (just saw this word used on fb).  She’s having a girl!  As big sis noted in her previous post, I’m getting a bit anxious thinking about all the events coming up…craft fairs, baby shower, bridal shower, two summer weddings, and a bach party.  I’ve been keeping a journal of what I need to accomplish on a weekly basis or else I know I’ll get behind.  It’s nice to be busy but with my lil one starting on solids and knowing that I’ll be gone for a day cause of the bach party, I’ve now added making Lila’s food and pumping to my nightly routine.

Anyhow, back to the tutorial…I wanted something simple and cute for the invitation and here is the end result:

Sorry for the poor quality of the pic!

This was fairly easy to make except for the elephants’ tails.  They were a bit tricky because I braided each one individually.

Materials:

• Bazzill Cardstock in Neutral
• Melissa Frances Order Paper
• Vellum
• Patterned paper for the elephants (mine are mini polka dots in pink)
• Martha Stewart’s Elephant Punch
• Embroidery Thread in green
• Zots 3-D Glue Dots
• Corner Punch
• Glue Stick
• Paper Cutter

1.)  Cut your cardstock according to the size desired with a paper cutter or rotary trimmer.

2.)  Cut your background paper 1/4″ less on all sides so that you can see the cardstock.

3.)  Print out your invitation on the vellum.  I was able to fit four invitations on one piece of vellum so I didn’t have to waste much of the paper.  Cut your vellum a little less than the background paper.  The vellum is see through, so it doesn’t matter if it’s 1/4″ or less because you will be able to see the background regardless.  *Note that you need to leave 1.5″ above the wording because this space will be for the elephants.

4.)  Punch out your elephants from your patterned paper.

5.)  Get your embroidery thread and cut a 10″ piece.  I realized that if I cut more than that, it was hard to braid. Make a knot at the top and separate your thread in three sections.  Tape the knot on the edge of a table and start braiding.  Did you ever make friendship bracelets?  If so, you’ll know that it’s easier to braid when it’s taped to an edging.  When you get to the end of the braid, knot it secure.  Measure about 3/4″ from the top and make a knot.  You will continue to do this until you get several tails.  Repeat this step till you get the desired amount of tails.

6.)  Glue your papers (cardstock, background, vellum) together with your glue stick.

7.)  For each elephant and tail, I used one Zots glue. Make sure you place the dot in the perfect position because these dots are no joke…they are sticky lil suckers!  Place the tail on the glue dot then your punched elephant on top. You may want to start with the middle elephant just so you can be sure they are centered.  After all the elephants and tails are glued, use your fingers to place the tails under the trunks of the adjacent elephant (so it looks like they are holding “hands”…you know what I mean).

8.)  Punch all four corners with the corner punch and voila, you’re done!

 

***Fonts used:  Little Days (cursive) and Century Schoolbook***

lil sis