sewing lover's bulletin board

 

What you will need:

sewing starter kit

about two medium patterns

bulletin board

mod podge
hot glue and gun

pencil

fabric

fabric button kit

pliers

step one: mod podge patterns on to bulletin board. you want to layer them, but try to stay as close to one layer as possible.

 Step two: cut pattern paper into 2" squares. this does not have to be exact. wrap the squares around the end of a pencil. put a spot of hot glue on the tip and stick it on the frame. you can make this as thick or thin as you want.

 Step three: hot glue sewing kit items around the edge however you would like.

Step four: make button push pins. you will want to use pliers to remove the loop on the back of the fabric buttons. then follow the instructions that come with the fabric button kit.

hot glue thumb tacts to the back of the buttons. you can also use regular buttons as well.

science kit

This was so fun!

I made this kit for my nephew for Christmas.

first I gathered science experiments from Science Bob. and printed out the ones I felt were age appropriate (he's four).  

 

I then gathered some of the supplies that were commonly mentioned in what was needed for the experiments (like balloons, food coloring.)

I found kid safety glasses on Amazon (came in a pack of six)

I made the lab coat out of a mans button up white shirt. I choose to buy one, but I'm sure an old one would be a cheap, great idea. I cut off the bottom a bit and hemmed it and used the fabric I cut off to make the pockets. 

I put it all together in a bin I bought at Walmart and it was done!

Ginger bread fun!

My family started to do gingerbread creations last year and the tradition I think is here to stay.

This year my husband and I decided to do a nativity scene.

nativity scene

angel

Joseph, Mary, and baby Jesus

three wisemen

cant forget the camels

Donkey (I know it looks more like a horse, right?)

Shepherds and their sheep

Here are some from last year. 

our train

log cabin

out house to the cabin

Salt Lake City Temple

Wooden Airport

My oldest stinker toad loves trains and has more wooden train pieces then I care to count. 

Well stinker toad 2 loves airplanes almost as much as his brother does trains. So we wanted to get him a wooden airport.

I couldn't spend much on it this year because Santa was cutting back, so I decided to take this idea I had in my mind and make one. (why do I do things like this?)

Santa's quality was not so good this year.

let's just say it fell apart that same day.

Over all the boys love it and still play with the pieces, but I would be doing things different if I re-did it.

Note to self: don't use fiber-wood and hot glue.

I would use real wood and liquid nails if I was doing it over again.
[update: after doing my homework, I would use Gorilla Glue or Zap-a-Gap. I still would not recommend fiber type wood.]

(sorry the picture quality is so bad i took it with my phone with the intention to take more with my camera later. didn't happen)

meant to look like a suitcase closed up

open up to a runway and airport

It was still pretty neat looking before it was played with.

Things to come!

It's been awhile, I had a family death that threw me off my creative game for awhile, but I'm back and have started working on some projects for Christmas.

I have also started on my Boy's rooms and am so excited to see how they turn out. Here are some pictures to give you a taste of what to come.

Also I wanted to show my mom opening her nutcrackers! so enjoy!

LDS Missionary Nutcrackers

My mom has a large nutcracker collection she put out in her home every Christmas season. I also have two brothers a year apart in age, who have chosen to serve religious missions for the LDS church (AKA mormons). My mother is very proud of them so I thought of this idea last Christmas season to make missionary nutcrackers. Honestly I thought that maybe someone had thought of this already and I could just buy some, but I could not find any. I decided I would make some. I went to all the craft stores I could find to get a unpainted nutcracker, but had a really hard time finding one that would work, because they all had crowns or hats on them. well to make a longer story shorter I did not find what I was looking for. Then After Christmas I went to Target and checked out their clearance Christmas items and came across what I wanted.

Before

After

 LDS missions are two years long so my brothers will be overlapping a year. One left last year about this time and the other will be leaving a few days after Christmas this year. I am posting this now because I gave them to my mom yesterday for her birthday (Happy Birthday MOM!) so she could display them this Christmas season.

 

The above photo has a hat and a belt buckle, which are not worn by LDS missionaries, but I could not resist the belt buckle because my youngest brother is known for his many large belt buckles. He is going to be serving in the Ghana, Accra mission.

 

 This nutcracker seemed the most ironic to work as a LDS missionary. Mormons do not believe in gambling (see above photo). It was fun to replace the face cards with a Book of Mormon and pass-a-long cards. This brother has been out almost a year and he is serving in the Uganda, Kampala mission. yup both in Africa.

The ties are made from ribbon, the name tags, book, and cards where printed off my computer and mod-podged on. I sewed the pants onto the nutcracker (a lot harder then you would think. because I did not disconnect the doll from the stand I had to hand sew it onto the doll. It is on the inseam so it was not as noticeable). I used the buttons from the one nutcracker and I painted the years, name of brother and name of mission onto the base of each one.

Other birthday party ideas

We have had a party every year for each of my boys, even the day I came home from the Hospital with toad 2, we had a party for toad 1 (my mom helped a lot with that one). Here are some cakes and ideas from the past birthdays at our house and one from my sister's house, because it was so cute I had to throw it in.

snake cake

dinosaur cake

pin the horn on the dino or a pinata.

drum cake

ducky cups

duck snacks and cakes

ducky cake

ducky cake

ducky cake

Here is a cute carnival birthday party.